Bhubaneswar: In a major relief to cricket lovers of Odisha, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) today said the bottle-throwing incident during a T20 match between India and South Africa last year should not come in the way of the Barabati stadium hosting another international match.
“See, there is no point in thinking about the incident. Whatever happened has happened. I personally feel that the state cricket association should not suffer because of one incident. They should be given a strict warning to ensure that such things never happen in future so that the BCCI would allot more matches to be played here, BCCI secretary Anurag Thakur told media persons here.
Thakur denied allegations that the Board is not shying away from acting on the Lodha Committee report. "BCCI is not looking for any escape route. We want to discuss the Lodha Committee report in detail. The discussion would be held at the special general meeting in Mumbai on February 19,” he said.
He said the meeting, to be attended by all state cricket associations, would discuss the mode of implementation of the Lodha Committee’s recommendation in the present context.
Notably, the Supreme Court has asked the BCCI to implement the recommendation of the Lodha Committee by March 3.
It may be recalled that a section of the crowd had thrown plastic water bottles to the playground of Barabati stadium following the poor show of the home team against the visiting South African team during the second the T20 day and night match between India and South Africa on October 5 last year. Following the incident, the match referee had stopped the match mid-way and awarded the match to South Africa.
Following the incident, the BCCI excluded Barabati stadium here from the list of newly declared Test venues at a meeting in Mumbai on November 12.
Expressing dissatisfaction over the incident, chief minister Naveen Patnaik had asked the principal secretary, Home to probe the unsavoury incident and submit a report within a month.
On the basis of the report submitted by the principal secretary to the state government, the State Police asked the Odisha Cricket Association (OCA) to take corrective measures to ensure that such incidents don’t recur in future.