JOHANNESBURG: Dope-testing on players will carry on as the International Cricket Council (ICC) continues negotiations with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) over the controversial “whereabouts” clause, the ICC said on Wednesday.
The ICC implemented the new WADA code on Jan. 1, according to which players are supposed to reveal details of their location for an hour every day for the next three months to an ICC-nominated officer. The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has led opposition to this clause, prompted by their players’ refusal to reveal the information due to security and privacy concerns in a country in which the sport enjoys a fanatical following. “The doping question is best described as a work in progress. We will have further meetings with WADA and we hope to have a situation that is acceptable to Wada and all the cricket-playing nations,” ICC president David Morgan told a news conference.
The strong opposition to the “whereabouts” clause, with Australia, England, South Africa, New Zealand, Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe and Bangladesh all believed to support India’s stance, led the ICC to suspend it from its doping code.
“We will still do in and out-of-competition testing because we all have zero tolerance for doping,” ICC chief executive officer Haroon Lorgat said. “We need to find a solution to the practical problem India is having, which is a constitutional issue of the country which is why we decided to suspend the ‘whereabouts’ clause.”
The ICC is also setting up a working group to look at the promotion of all three formats of the game, tests, one-day internationals and Twenty20s.
“We will be looking at promoting each format and ensuring there is an adequate balance. We will look at the landscape of the game and perhaps also the volume of cricket played,” Lorgat said.
Morgan said test cricket would remain the most important version of the game.
“We continue to recognise test cricket as the pinnacle, it is the format which cricketers aspire to. The recent series between England and Australia for the Ashes was wonderful and we want to make others as important as that and India versus Pakistan,” Morgan said.
