Sri Lanka on Friday confirmed that they have submitted their complaint to the International Cricket Council (ICC) for the way their team has been treated in the ongoing T20 World Cup 2024 which is being played in the United States and West Indies.
Sri Lanka, along with the Netherlands, are the only teams scheduled to play their first-round matches at four different venues: New York, Dallas, Florida, and St Lucia and they are not appreciating how things have been made difficult for them.
Even after their warm-up match against Ireland, they were stranded at the Florida airport for seven hours and reached New York with a delay which forced them to cancel a training session.
Sri Lanka’s sports minister Harin Fernando confirmed that the team lodged a formal complaint after they had to wait at the Florida airport for seven hours and asked the ICC for an explanation.
“Sri Lanka Cricket has complained to the ICC,” Fernando told parliament on Friday. “Different countries are being treated differently. We have called for an explanation from the organisers of the tournament.”
The opposition leader in Sri Lanka parliament Sajith Premadasa stated that that everyone in the house is standing behind the team and are upset over the way they have been treated.
Sri Lanka played their first match of the T20 World Cup against South Africa in New York where they posted their lowest total in T20Is and lost.
The Islanders’ spinner Maheesh Theekshana talked after the match where he slammed the ICC for being given an unfair deal regarding the scheduling.
“It’s so unfair for us, we have to leave every day because we are playing [at] four different venues,” Theekshana said.
“It’s unfair. The flight we took from Florida, from Miami, we had to wait like eight hours in the airport to get the flight. And we came around. We were supposed to leave at 8pm but we got the flight at 5am. It’s really unfair for us, but it doesn’t matter when you play.”
