The inaugural Champions League Twenty20 is facing a potential boycott from international umpires. The EUE — the union that has on board all ICC Elite panel umpires and several one-day panel umpires — has indicated to the BCCI that no members will be available for the October 8-23 tournament unless they recognise the EUE and agree to the umpire representation process.

The development comes after the CL organisers refused to appoint Simon Taufel, Steve Davis and Billy Bowden, who wanted the umpires’ union to be involved in the procedure, and directly approached Daryl Harper and Russell Tiffin to stand in the tournament.

Both Harper and Tiffin have declined the offer from the CL organisers.

In an email communication on September 8, Taufel wrote to Steve Davis: “It was very important to show the BCCI that we are not a threat to them by compromising on the umpires for CL if we were able to have them recognise us in the future and agree to our contact terms/process, but that if they did not accept this compromise, then to seek the direction of the other umpires and advise them that it would be best to have none of our umpires attend the CL event and let them run their tournament without any of our members.”

Taufel also mentioned “the BCCI not recognising the EUE and umpire representation process, individual umpires being visible in the negotiation process and the ICC management continuing to undermine our agreed process” as their main challenges.

... contd.