CSA chairman under pressure to quit post

Melbourne – Cricket Australia chairman David Peever (right) faced growing calls to quit yesterday after a damning review slammed the body’s conduct leading up to a major ball-tampering scandal.

The independent review released on Monday found that an “arrogant” and “controlling” culture within Cricket Australia contributed to players cheating in the pursuit of victory.

Peever has so far avoided an exodus of senior figures after the scandal, when players were caught using sandpaper to alter the ball in a Test match against South Africa in March.

Cricket Australia CEO James Sutherland, coach Darren Lehmann and team performance boss Pat Howard all resigned. Then-captain Steve Smith and his deputy David Warner were banned for 12 months, and batsman Cameron Bancroft for nine months.

Peever, a former Rio Tinto mining executive who was reappointed for a second term as chairman only last week, said he wouldn’t step aside.

“The work was never about wanting to dwell on negatives,” Peever told national broadcaster ABC on Monday night.

“This is a very important day for cricket and we are moving forward from here,” he added.

But former fast bowler Geoff Lawson said the chairman should be replaced by someone who had played at the elite level.

“We need a serious cricketing figurehead, not a corporate cricket figurehead,” he told Fox News.

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd also entered the debate, tweeting #PeeverShouldResign.

“So let’s get this straight. #CricketAustralia, under David Peever, has overseen the destruction of the intn’l image of our national game. But Peever gets re-appointed as Chair last wk, 3 days before release of damning Longstaff Report?”

The Australian Cricketers’ Association (ACA) said in light of the scathing assessment, CA must share responsibility for the scandal, calling the suspensions on Smith, Warner and Bancroft to be lifted.

“With this new information, common sense, common decency, basic fairness, proportionality and natural justice demand that the punishment is reduced,” ACA President Greg Dyer told reporters in Melbourne. –