No tolerance for abusive sledging, ICC tells players

Players have been told there will be zero tolerance of racist or homophobic abuse as the International Cricket Council monitors sledging at the World Cup.

Teams know that stump microphones are now more sensitive and will pick up on-field comments and potentially broadcast them to audiences watching at home, causing embarrassment to the game if bad language or abuse is heard.

Shannon Gabriel, the West Indies fast bowler, was fined and suspended following an incident with Joe Root in the third Test in St Lucia in February. The stump mic picked Root up saying: “There is nothing wrong with being gay,” in response to a taunt from Gabriel.

“The definition of sledging is always difficult. One point we have emphasised in all team briefings is to uphold a good standard of behaviour,” said David Richardson, the ICC chief executive.

“Any malicious or personal comments won’t be tolerated. Over the last 12 months there has been a significant improvement and generally teams have been very well behaved. Any kind of racism [or] homophobic comments, there will be zero tolerance for and the code of conduct will apply. Twelve months ago we introduced more severe penalties for this type of sledging and we will implement it in the same fashion in this event.”

World Cup security advisers are confident the tournament will pass off without incident, despite recent terrorist incidents in New Zealand and Sri Lanka.

Jill Mccracken, the ICC’S safety and security director, said: “The threat in the UK is always around crowded places, they look for mass casualties, but when you look at the security measures that we have around the venues, around the teams, and the background work we do, that actually reduces [the] threat.”