Sri Lanka’s 1996 World Cup-winning captain, Arjun Ranatunga, has voiced his opinions and criticism of the rule change in the middle of the Asia Cup 2023.
The Asian Cricket Council (ACC), headed by Jay Shah, who is also the BCCI Secretary, had made a sudden rule change in the playing conditions by adding a reserve day to the India vs Pakistan encounter in the Super 4 round of the Asia Cup.
After the Group A match between the two arch-rivals was washed out due to rain, the ACC added a reserve day to the Super 4 round match of India and Pakistan, but only to this one game and no reserve day for any other matches in the Super 4 round.
This irked everyone as it gave an unfair advantage to the winner of that match, which turned out to be India when the match was pushed into the reserve day by the rain. Had the reserve day not been added, things could have been different for India as they couldn’t have gained a big NRR lead and an additional point for the win.
Arjun Ranatunga, who had also served on the ICC’s Cricket Committee and also been the chairman at Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) in the past, expressed his disappointment with this rule change in the middle of the tournament, and that too for only one match.
Ranatunga said that money is all that matters for the boards and not cricket.
“I am not very comfortable with some of the things, especially when you have a tournament where you change rules for one team. You’re looking at a disaster in the future. No one talks about it. Have you ever seen a single cricketer talk about this rule change? No. Why? They don’t want to miss the buck. Simple as that,” Ranatunga said while speaking with Select Media.
“ICC is the toothless tiger”: Arjun Ranatunga
Arjun Ranatunga further blasted the “toothless” ICC for allowing the ACC to tweak the rules during the tournament. Although he didn’t directly take BCCI’s name, Arjun Ranatunga made his opinion clear that cricket was being run by one particular board.
“I don’t know whether the ICC is acting today or whether we have ICC. They always say ICC is the toothless tiger. They act in a very unprofessional way. I think they are the ones who should look at cricket and protect cricket. Ultimately, cricket should be controlled by the ICC, not by a country or an individual,” the 59-year-old added.
India and Sri Lanka will play the final on Sunday in Colombo.
