ICC Chief Executive Malcolm Speed reflects on recent comments concerning the ICC in the Indian media

ICC Chief Executive Officer Malcolm Speed today reflected on recent comments concerning the organization that have appeared in the Indian media.

"We are here to run a cricket tournament with the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and that is our focus," he said.

"We hope we have a great tournament and by the time we finish I hope we can forget about any off-field dramas that have taken place and find ourselves talking about some great cricket," he said.

"Mr (Lalit) Modi has made a lot of comments and expressed a lot of opinions, often strident ones about the ICC, what he perceives to be wrong with the ICC and how the ICC needs an Afro-Asian CEO.

"We see those opinions, we note them and take them into account, but it should be pointed out that Mr Modi has never been to an ICC meeting and has never represented India in an ICC meeting.

"He has been vice-president of the BCCI for one year and he has been president of his local association for two years. I think he has a lot of promise as a cricket administrator and I think he has done a great deal for the BCCI in that one year.

"But there are other people within Indian cricket, and several of them have attended ICC meetings and understand how it operates, as a democracy.

"We are always happy to listen to opinions about the ICC but when people are forming those opinions they should always bear in mind our organisation is made up of 97 Members rather than just one."