ICC WORLD TWENTY20, 2016

ICC 'removes' Kotla as World Twenty20 venue, restores it later

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Kotla is scheduled to host four World T20 games apart from women's World T20 matches. © Cricbuzz

In a major goof-up, the International Cricket Council (ICC), on its official website, removed Delhi's Ferozeshah Kotla from the list of venues for the 2016 World Twenty20, which gets under way in less than a month's time. The glitch was set right by Wednesday afternoon (February 10) but not before causing a flutter in the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and Delhi District Cricket Association (DDCA).

Kotla is scheduled to host four World T20 games apart from women's World T20 matches. But the venue has been dogged by controversies lately and its status as a host remains under question.

The ICC, in a rush to declare the final fixtures list, not only removed Kotla as one of the venues but also named Nagpur and Bengaluru as replacement centres.

The BCCI, however, was clueless about the development. "We have not made any changes to the World T20 venues list yet. Kotla is very much scheduled to host the matches. I will need to have a word with ICC regarding these fixtures," Ratnakar Shetty, BCCI's game development manager, told TOI when informed about the new list of fixtures.

Anurag Thakur, BCCI secretary, has said last Friday that the board already had a `Plan B' in place in case the DDCA failed to come up with required civic clearances in time in order to host the games. It seems that ICC's goof-up has revealed this plan a little ahead of schedule.

Within half an hour of TOI's call to Shetty, Kotla was restored as one of the seven venues. "It must have been a communication or technical error which resulted in this mistake. The correct fixtures are back on the website. The call for change of venues has to come from the host board, in this case the BCCI. We can't make that decision. If there are any changes in venues, ICC will be the first to inform the media," an ICC source told TOI.

However, ICC's explanation seems a little hard to fathom because alternate venues were also mentioned in these new fixtures. The group games had been allotted to Nagpur while the second semi-final scheduled for March 31 had been given to Bengaluru.

Hilariously, in their hurry to correct the mistakes on the website, ICC has made more goof-ups - the new list of fixtures now shows Kotla hosting India's match against a qualifier on March 23rd, a game which is scheduled for Bengaluru. Besides, the original lineup has England taking on a qualifier at Kotla on the same day.

DDCA officials too expressed surprise at the development. "The BCCI hasn't told us anything about moving the World T20 games out of Kotla. In fact, they asked us to send them a copy of our communication with the local civic body to ensure that games can take place without a hitch.

"We have told them the process of getting clearances is on and all renovation work will be finished in the next 10 days. We're confident that we'll get the final completion certificate," Chetan Chauhan, DDCA vice-president, said on Wednesday. "We have removed some seats and raised the height of the railings, so the stadium is up-to-date with safety norms."

© TNN

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