Discipline panel will quiz pair
A few dressing-room beers turns into more at the hotel & a night out drinking shots.. cricket HAS to up its game
FROM BACK PAGE stand trial. The 27-year-old has no worries about returning to action against India at Trent Bridge – at the expense of one of the players involved in last week’s crushing win – after such an emotionally draining week at Bristol Crown Court.
But the Cricket Discipline Commission will now probe the behaviour of Stokes and Alex Hales, who was with him when violence flared, to decide whether they brought the game into disrepute.
CDC chairman Tim O’Gorman, a former player and a qualified solicitor, will put together a three-strong panel for a hearing likely to be in the autumn, and certainly not before the international season ends on September 11.
Should they rule against Stokes and Hales, they could impose bans or fines – or both – on players who have already missed a number of matches.
Some may say Stokes’ absence from the Ashes tour was enough, although he was still on full pay and it was not technically a punishment.
Even so, the CDC may choose to backdate and include those matches plus the one-day games at the end of last season in any further sanctions.
“I’m really happy the verdict has come out the way it has for English cricket,” said international team-mate Jonny Bairstow.
“I’m delighted and hope we can see him back in an England shirt very, very soon because we saw the impact he had at Edgbaston only a couple of weeks ago in the first Test.”