CM Jenkins: TCCB retain right to rest players (21 Aug 1996)

21 August 1996

TCCB retain right to rest players

By Christopher Martin-Jenkins

THE Test and County Cricket Board gave their blessing to the proposed new England Management Committee at their summer meeting at Lord`s yesterday but, predictably, retained their independence on the question of keeping England cricketers fresh. They insisted on retaining the right to say when players in their employ should play for their counties.

The other recommendations of the Acfield Working Party into the running of England affairs were accepted in full. The EMC will be a nine-man committee running all aspects of the England team with their own chairman elected by the counties. There will be no vote on England selection for the coach and the EMC will appoint the coach and the chairman of selectors.

So far the promise of county chairmen to "lend a sympathetic ear" when an England player needs a rest has been honoured. But this was a matter of principle. The implication is that counties will continue to refuse to give the England team priority even though they depend on profits generated by international cricket. Moreover, it suggests that had the Acfield Working Party proposed that England players should be contracted to the board the motion would also have been rejected.

Asked whether such an issue would still be determined by the counties rather than the executives of the governing body when the TCCB are replaced by a more streamlined organisation next year, Tim Lamb, who will be chief executive from October, answered in the affirmative. It does not bode well for more breathing spaces in the domestic programme when another working party survey the whole structure this winter. The review has been put forward a year so sponsors and television companies can plan for changes from 1999.

The board also rejected by a majority vote the cricket committee proposal that there should be no overseas players in county cricket in 1999 and 2000. The moratorium on signing new players after 1998 still exists, but it is to be reviewed in the autumn. A C Smith, the chief executive, said: "The counties felt that overseas players add a quality to our game which should not be discarded."

The counties received a preliminary report from David Morgan on the plans for the ECB, which will be debated in full on Sept 24.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)