The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Wednesday said the meeting of representatives of the member boards in Dubai is a workshop and not a Chief Executives Committee (CEC) meeting.
"The meeting is not an official Chief Executives Committee (CEC) meeting and that the member representatives have come at their own cost. It’s only a workshop," ICC chief executive David Richardson told Sportstar .
ICC’s quarterly CEC meeting will take place at Cape Town from October 9 to 13.
"The meeting here is attended, not exactly by Chief Executives, but their representatives. Only the officially nominated Chief Executives (in the BCCI’s case Ajay Shirke) can attend the CEC meeting," said an ICC official. BCCI CEO Rahul Johri represents the board in the informal sessions.
The workshop in Dubai has been facilitated by the ICC only for the representatives of the members and others to discuss the two-division system for Test matches as proposed by Cricket Australia (CA) and Cricket South Africa (CSA). The two Boards were supposed to have made the proposal at the annual conference in Edinburgh in July.
A senior ICC official who attended the ICC annual conference in Edinburgh said: "Cricket Australia and Cricket South Africa proposed the two-division system to enable the top seven nations engage in competitive cricket. They felt there has to be content and substance in Test match cricket. They also proposed that the television rights of the Test matches involving the top seven countries be bundled and be marketed.’’
But the members were told that the ICC does not have the rights over bilateral series and such a proposal cannot be on its agenda.
"Top ICC officials told the member boards that since such a proposal involves bilateral series, it is for the member boards to meet and arrive at a decision and should all boards agree to the proposal, the ICC may give its stamp of approval. So the ICC gave the member boards an opportunity to meet at Dubai and take the matter forward," said an official.
Federation of International Cricketers Association (FICA), too, called for a change in the structure of international cricket.
"It is clear that there is a ground swell of opinion around the world that the current structure of international cricket is not serving the game globally and that the status quo is not good enough for the long term future success of cricket," said Tony Irish, FICA's executive chairman.
South Africa’s AB de Villiers backed the proposal saying "It’s time for all international matches to have more meaning."
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