ICC clears speculation regarding Pakistan umpire Aleem Dar

The International Cricket Council (ICC) has cleared up the speculation regarding the withdrawal of Pakistan umpires Aleem Dar from the Test series against England. Earlier, Aleem Dar had been one of the players who had been withdrawn from the grand scheme of things citing security reasons.

However, the ICC has cleared this rumor up by stating that the Pakistani-based umpire was not appointed for the India v England encounter as he has already been nominated for the Australia-South Africa Test series starting November 3. India host England in a five-match Test series with the first Test commencing at Rajkot on the 9th of November.

Kumar Dharmasena, Paul Reffiel, Bruce Oxenford, Rod Tucker, Chris Gaffaney and Marais Erasmus are the umpires who have been selected as a part of the umpiring panel for the upcoming series against England with Ranjan Madugalle and Jeff Crowe expected to preside as the match referees for the matches.

An ICC spokesperson went on to state that an umpire could only be withdrawn if he had been appointed in the first place which was most certainly not the case as far as Aleem Dar was concerned.

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“Two things – a person can only be withdrawn if he had been appointed first and you know officials of the India-England series were never appointed with Dar in it. So how can someone say he has been withdrawn. Secondly, and more importantly, Dar had been named for the Australia-South Africa series and he is already in Perth for the first Test. Once his appointment was done for that series, it is very wrong to assume he has been withdrawn by ICC for the India series,” the ICC spokesman said.

With the political unrest prevailing between India and Pakistan at the moment, it seems highly unlikely that the ICC would take a risk and appoint a Pakistan umpire, especially given the fact that many of the Pakistani famous faces are fleeing the country at the moment.