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Global T20 (GT20) Canada franchise Mississauga Bangla Tigers owner and CEO Zaffir Yasin has landed major accusations on the tournament's logistical preparedness, citing "not fit to play" conditions, altering boundary sizes, and last-minute rule changes.
His comments come after a major controversy erupted in the tournament Eliminator match between the Tigers and the Toronto Nationals. The start of the match was delayed due to heavy rain. The tournament technical committee released a statement the next day that they had decided to award the game to the Nationals, citing that the Tigers captain Shakib Al Hasan and his team "refused to appear" at the toss.
"First things first, the conditions were not fit to play," Yasin told Cricket.com in an interview. "That was loud and clear. In the whole tournament, when other captains [Chris Lynn, Usman Khawaja, Colin Munro and Marcus Stoinis] complained that the field conditions were not fit to play, the tournament committee, the technical committee accepted and the match referee all accepted that. And they were right."
He added:
“Plus, there were other issues. The officials altered the size of the boundary after the official start time of the match. And additionally, they were decreasing the boundary size without an official measurement. They did it by themselves; they had no idea what they were doing. The ground took up a zig-zag structure on one side.”
Yasin alleged that even Colin Munro, the Nationals' captain didn't deem the conditions fit to play. However, he was forced to try at least because if the match was abandoned, his team would have been eliminated as they were placed below the Tigers in the group stage.
"Have you ever seen a situation where a match is decided by a Super Over because it’s raining heavily?" - Yasin
The technical committee in its statement said it tried to organise a Super Over to get the match to a result when rain stopped. Yasin alleged that his team wanted to play a five-over game, which is the minimum threshold according to the ICC playing conditions -- which the GT20 promised to follow.
"One day before the match, and also on the day of the game, they shared a message on Whatsapp saying that a Super Over will be played in case a 5-over game isn’t possible," he added in the interview. "Have you ever seen a situation where a match is decided by a super over because it’s raining heavily?
“This rule was made one day before on Whatsapp. That’s a significant change in the playing conditions which should have been discussed with the Technical Committee, The Owners and Cricket Canada because this is a whole different rule altogether."
As it happened, the Nationals went on to win both the second Qualifier and the final by five wickets.
