NEW DELHI: The Indian cricket board on Monday formally rejected the request made by the Hyderabad Cricket Association (HCA) to modify the schedule of the ICC World Cup 2023.
The HCA had sought the intervention of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to alter the schedule due to concerns raised by local police authorities regarding the availability of sufficient personnel for consecutive match days.
"BCCI secretary Jay Shah held a meeting with HCA officials in Delhi after the Asia Cup team selection meeting (for which the secretary is convenor) and the state unit was categorically told that no changes would be entertained after a revised schedule was issued on August 9," a BCCI source informed.
The BCCI vice-president Rajeev Shukla had already indicated on Sunday that "changes (to the schedule) were unlikely."
The initial World Cup schedule, which was unveiled with much excitement on June 27 in Mumbai, underwent a series of modifications that affected the dates and timings of nine matches, including the highly anticipated encounter between India and Pakistan.
Originally slated for October 15, the India-Pakistan match was rescheduled to October 14 due to it coinciding with the first day of Navratra.
This alteration consequently led to the advancement of Pakistan's game against Sri Lanka in Hyderabad from October 11 to October 10. Moreover, Hyderabad was also designated to host the match between the Netherlands and New Zealand on October 9.
As a result of these changes, local police authorities advocated for a minimum of one day's interval between the two matches scheduled in Hyderabad.
However, that would have meant slotting the New Zealand vs Netherlands game on October 8. It would have put a lot of stress on the teams and both the countries wouldn't have agreed upon.
New Zealand are playing England in the opening game on October 5 in Ahmedabad and the next day they will fly to Hyderabad and would have received only one training session (on October 7) in that case.
Netherlands open their campaign against Pakistan on October 6 in Hyderabad and advancement by a day meant that October 7 would go in recovery and next day they would be playing again.
Neither ICC nor the two boards (NZC and Netherlands authority known as KNCB) would have agreed to this request.
(With PTI inputs)
