Sri Lanka Cricket to Contest ICC Charge over Inconsistent Application of Rules

An interesting legal battle is at hands between the lawyers of Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) and International Cricket Council (ICC) after the former decided to contest the ICC sanctions issued on Thursday.

Meanwhile, ICC Match Referee, Javagal Srinath found Dinesh Chandimal guilty of tampering with the ball. Chandimal used some external substance along with saliva to change the shape of the ball during the second Test against the Windies.

Minutes later, the ICC announced CEO, David Richardson had charged Chandimal, head coach, Chandika Hathurusingha and manager, Asanka Gurusinha of a more severe Level three offence which relates to conduct that is contrary to the Spirit of the game.

ICC charged Sri Lankan team members for holding the play for two hours on the morning of day three.

SLC officials were in discussion with the Sri Lankan side late Wednesday and decided to contest the charge. SLC sources said the board would inform the decision to the ICC Thursday morning.

As a result, ICC will now have to appoint a Judicial Commissioner to hear the case. Furthermore, the sanctioned trio will now not miss the third and final Test of the series.

However, if found guilty after that, they will miss the most part of home series against South Africa.

Sri Lanka is likely to contest the charge on the grounds of the inconsistency of application of the rule.

SLC will also bring charges of inconsistency against match referee Srinath. The tourists claimed when they were reluctant to take the field, Srinath had assured there would be no imposition of the five penalty runs sanction or a change of change the ball.

However, when they took the field, the umpires did the opposite holding up play again.

They are also likely to accuse umpire Ian Gould of getting carried away after the ball-tampering fiasco in South Africa early this year that saw three Australian players getting suspended.

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