ICC bans team officials from tweeting during World Cup
THE ICC HAVE imposed a blanket ban on team officials tweeting during World Cup matches in a bid to cut out any possibility of the social networking site being used as a tool for potential corruption.
Following on from the spot-fixing scandal involving Pakistan, the governing body have decided to eliminate the possibility of coaches and officials leaving themselves open to corruption claims, however baseless, as a result of tweeting.
“As recent events have shown, the ICC has a zero-tolerance approach to corruption. Anything that can negate that possibility is something we are definitely interested in,” said ICC spokesman James Fitzgerald. “This is just a precaution, it’s not something we are overly concerned about. But we do feel a team manager’s phone should be used for operational purposes only during matches.”
Kevin Pietersen was fined an undisclosed sum last year by the England and Wales Cricket Board for a Twitter tirade which followed a decision to drop him from the one-day team, while Aussie opener Phillip Hughes endured the wrath of Cricket Australia when he announced that he’d been dropped from the third Ashes Test in 2009.