ICC Associates endorse new tournament structure

The International Cricket Council's Associates Meeting took place today with discussions focusing on issues affecting the ICC's 27 Associate Members and 47 Affiliate Members including a new tournament structure, player eligibility, increased representation of the Affiliate nations, and membership issues.

The Associates endorsed a new tournament structure for the Associate and Affiliate nations. The new tournament structure will involve the following two elements:

- Regional qualifying tournaments in 2004 for Associate and Affiliate nations leading to global events in 2005

- Two global qualifying events in 2005 (one of which is the ICC Trophy) leading to the ICC Cricket World Cup in 2007

The recommended structure will now pass to the ICC Executive Board for approval on Wednesday 18 June.

To balance the conflicting aims of allowing promising cricketers to play for the Associate member nation of their birth while not depriving them of the dream of Test Match cricket, the four-year stand-down period between representing an Associate member at international level and representing a Full member has been abolished.

Talented young players from Associate nations will now be able to represent the Associate nation for which they are eligible while not prejudicing their chances of representing one of the Full member nations in the future. The four-year stand-down period from playing for a Full member to playing for an Associate member remains, as do all other standard eligibility requirements.

Today's meeting was the first Associates Meeting attended by representatives of the ICC's Affiliate nations. The five delegates from Bahamas, Oman, Sierra Leone, Spain and Vanuatu attended this year's meeting as observers representing the five ICC development regions but from next year they will be given voting rights at the Associates Meeting and observer status at the Annual Conference.

The Associates Meeting recommended the introduction of Zambia as an independent Associate member of the ICC. Formerly part of the combined East and Central Africa with Malawi, Zambia will now hold Associate member status in its own right if the decision is approved at the ICC Annual Conference on Thursday 19 June. Malawi will become an Affiliate member in its own right.

There are also four applications for Affiliate membership that will go before the ICC Annual Conference - Iran, Mozambique, Rwanda, and Saudi Arabia. If all are accepted the ICC's membership will increase to 89 nations.

The schedule of meetings continues on Wednesday with the ICC Executive Board meeting.

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