USACA goes to court

Several individuals who have been waging a determined battle against the existing USA Cricket Association executive and who have set up a rival board, have been served with legal papers ordering them to cease and desist from their actions.

The legal action has been instigated by USACA in New York and is aimed at preventing a number of named individuals - including Bobby Refaie, the suspended secretary of the board - from claiming to represent themselves as being in any way connected to, or representatives of, the USACA.

The manouvre was expected, but there are questions as to how this potentially expensive action has been funded. Gladstone Dainty, the USACA president, told Cricinfo last week that no board monies would be used to pay for legal action, but confusingly added that those funds would be spent "to defend the USACA from baseless attacks by the dissidents."

"The phrase double speak comes to mind," said Laks Sampath, a director of the North West region and one of those named in the action. "On one hand Dainty says that no ICC funds or membership dues have been used and in the very same breath adds that the board authorised him to `defend the USACA'. From whom? Its member clubs? The so called majority of the board that authorised this is in itself under dispute so there can be no majority of the board."

Coupled with the USACA's effective refusal to agree to independent arbitration - it announced that it would only go to arbitration under New York State law - this latest development would seem to only reduce the chances of any settlement between the two factions, a situation acknowled by Malcolm Speed who said that "it now seems likely that this matter will result in litigation or arbitration."

As things stand, the crunch could come when an extraordinary general meeting of the USACA, scheduled for June 4, takes place. The Dainty-led board does not recognise it, although opponents insist that it is legal as the requisite number of members have called for it. Dainty and his supporters have been invited but are not expected to attend.

A source close to the anti-Dainty faction said that it is likely that those named in the USACA's action will contest the case in court.