BCCI FILES COMPLAINT AGAINST SMITH
The Indian Cricket Board, on Thursday, lodged an official complaint with International Cricket Council (ICC) against Australian captain Steve Smith and Peter Handscomb for seeking dressing room help on a DRS call.
It was an interesting move by the BCCI after ICC issued a statement making it clear that no further action will be taken against either India skipper Virat Kohli or Smith.
It has been learnt that BCCI has emailed the documents along with video footage of the incident to the ICC, pressing Level 2 charges under the global body’s Code of Conduct.
“Yes, the BCCI today (Thursday) officially lodged a complaint with the ICC against Smith and Handscomb. They have submitted the video footage of the incident where Handscomb is insisting Smith to go up for a review and umpire Nigel Llong is seen intervening,” a top source said on the condition of anonymity.
“BCCI is well within their rights to lay official charge as a Level 2 charge needs to be pressed within 48 hours of the completion of the match,” the source added.
It was learnt that the BCCI has pressed charges for “violating spirit of cricket and bringing the game to disrepute”.
When a BCCI source was asked whether ICC will look into the matter, he said: “The rule states that CEO of member board needs to lay the charges within 48 hours in case of Level 2. That’s exactly what has been done. Also one should know that Peter Handscomb, on his official social media handle, has admitted to his guilt. Also why didn’t the ICC wait for 48 hours to end?”
It was learnt that BCCI has been irked by Cricket Australia’s strong statement defending Smith.
A feeling within the BCCI is that while it is perfectly okay to defend their captain, the tenor of the statement seemed to demean Kohli, which has not gone down well with the home team.
The Indian team management had expected that the match referee Chris Broad would summon Smith at the end of the game and was left perplexed following inaction on part of Broad.
Broad’s statement to an Australian media publication was also something that didn’t go unnoticed with the BCCI as match referees are not supposed to air their views in the media.
The ICC will now be in a tricky situation as the on-field umpires for the second Test till Wednesday had not submitted any official complaint.
On the other hand, batting legend Sunil Gavaskar has slammed the International Cricket Council (ICC) for not penalising Steven Smith after the Australian captain illegally sought the dressing room’s advice on a DRS referral during the second Test against India.
Gavaskar said he would love to see India captain Virat Kohli take the help of the dressing room for a DRS call in the next Test in Ranchi and not get penalised.
“It can’t be that some countries get favourable treatment and some countries do not get favourable treatment,” Gavaskar said.
“If an Indian player (seeks illegal advice from the changeroom) then he also should not be pulled up at all.
“I would actually love to see Virat Kohli, if he is given out (in the third Test), and he looks at the Indian dressing room, get some sort of feedback from them.
“Yes or no, I don’t know what signal they decide upon.
Let’s see what the match referee and the ICC decides then,” he said further.
The ICC on Wednesday decided not to press charges against Smith as well as opposition captain Kohli, who was quick to report Smith’s glance towards the dressing room with the on-field umpire.
The incident snowballed into a major controversy with the respective boards, BCCI and Cricket Australia, backing their respective captains.
Gavaskar said ICC match referee Chris Board did not see anything wrong in what Smith did and that was the end of it.
“(Broad) hasn’t seen that there is anything that was done that was in breach of the ICC Code of Conduct,” Gavaskar said.
“I can rave and rant and do whatever we have to do about it but the match referee says nothing’s the matter or at least that’s what the ICC statement suggests.
“You can say it’s wrong, it’s not correct, it’s a snub to the BCCI and Virat Kohli and the Indian team but basically that is that.”