http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Ehsan-Mani-c55791 – Cricket News Update
Ehsan Mani, former president of the International Cricket Council (ICC) has termed the governing body’s omission of Pakistani spinner Saeed Ajmal from the shortlist for the Test Cricketer of the Year award a “mistake”, and urged the ICC to admit the error and add Ajmal's name to the finalists.
“The stats speak clearly for Ajmal and there is absolutely no doubt that he was a deserving candidate to be in the shortlist,” Mani stressed. “I am aware of the selection process and its transparency but I feel the ICC has made a mistake over Ajmal. This is a mistake made at the executive level. The ICC must admit it and include the spinner among the final nominees.
“It needs strong leadership but it is still possible to make amends in the list,” he added. “If I were the ICC chief I would have ordered it.”
With the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/ICC-World-Cup-2011-c100625 Awards ceremony due to take place in Colombo on September 15, the drafting of shortlists for the categories has been in full swing, but controversy erupted when Ajmal, who had been present on the longlist for the Test Cricketer of the Year award, did not make it to the shortlist.
The 34-year-old is the ICC’s top ranked ODI bowler, and at number 3 on the Test bowler rankings. The off-spinner had claimed a total of 72 wickets in the extended-overs format of the game, during the qualifying period for the award - August 4, 2011 to August 6, 2012. In addition, he also played an instrumental role in http://www.senore.com/Cricket/England-c56013 in the UAE earlier this year, during which he claimed 24 wickets at 14.70.
His absence from the shortlist, which was chiselled down to http://www.senore.com/Cricket/GP-Swann-c1501 (who did not feature in the longlist, but was added later).
The ICC, however, has refused to entertain the request to reconsider Ajmal’s case, explaining that it holds no say over the procedure, with the final list of nominees having been decided by an independent academy of 32 distinguished cricket personalities, and the entire process being monitored by Ernst & Young, an independent auditor.
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