Ahead of the International Cricket Council (ICC) Annual Conference in Sri Lanka from July 19, the global body’s Head of Events Chris Tetley and General Manager of Marketing & Communication Claire Furlong have submitted their resignations after a very chaotic conduct of the recently concluded T20 World Cup in West Indies and USA.
CricketNext reached out to the ICC on the resignations of Furlong and Tetley, and the story will be updated moment the global body responds.
It is reliably understood that many Board of Directors had questioned the overshooting of budgets during the USA leg of the multi-nation event and Pankaj Khimji, Associate Member Director, wrote a letter to all members and called for an audit of the expenses incurred during that period.
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The matter is going to be discussed at length in Sri Lanka next week and a thorough investigation is likely to happen. More than the West Indies leg, it’s the expenses and activities during the USA leg which haven’t pleased many in the global body.
“Mr Khimji wrote a letter to all the members and highlighted the conduct and expenses during the USA leg of the T20 World Cup. A lot of action around this was expected during the ICC meeting in Sri Lanka later this month but the resignations have already started coming in,” says a source close to developments.
As CricketNext has been continuously reporting, there were no checks and balances on the expenses during the USA leg. The ICC was hoping against to hope to recover those costs via inflated ticket prices but that wasn’t the case, and a heavy loss was incurred during the USA leg of the tournament.
“Money was being spent left, right and centre without any vision. They were spending thousands of dollars on activations at a single site and failed to attract encouraging responses. There was no planning whatsoever. Few individuals chose to spend money the way they wished to,” says a senior USA Cricket official.
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USA were co-hosts of the tournament but they were mere spectators. None of the current office-bearers had any say during any stage of the tournament as all the work was carried out by ICC employees themselves. T20 USA Inc, which had people handpicked by ICC officials, did all the work of the tournament in USA and had Brett Jones in charge as the CEO.
“From where did Brett Jones come? He recently moved to the USA from Australia and was appointed CEO of a firm responsible for delivery in the USA. He is very close to Chris Tetley and no wonder he got a high position,” adds the USA cricket official.
ICC’s Annual Conference will take place in Sri Lanka from July 19 to July 22, and the Associates Meeting, scheduled for the opening day, is likely to witness a lot of discussions around the conduct of the T20 World Cup. The next three days will see meetings of the CEC, F&CA, and some informal board meetings and will culminate with the board meetings and the AGM on the final day.
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