Dubai: The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Tuesday named four World Cup winners in a 25-member match officials’ team for the Cricket World Cup 2015, to be co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand from February 14 to March 29.
The team includes five officials from the elite panel of ICC match referees, 12 umpires from the elite panel of ICC umpires and eight umpires from the international panel of ICC umpires.
The four match referees are David Boon, Chris Broad, Jeff Crowe, Ranjan Madugalle and Roshan Mahanama. The elite panel umpires list has Aleem Dar, Billy Bowden, Bruce Oxenford, Ian Gould, Kumar Dharmasena, Marais Erasmus, Nigel Llong, Paul Reiffel, Richard Illingworth, Richard Kettleborough, Rod Tucker and Steve Davis.
The international panel umpires will be Johan Cloete, Simon Fry, Chris Gaffaney, Michael Gough, Ranmore Martinesz, Ruchira Palliyaguru, S Ravi and Joel Wilson. The eight umpires from the international panel have been identified as emerging and talented match officials, who have already officiated at international level. The World Cup winners in the line-up are Boon, Dharmasena, Mahanama and Reiffel.
Boon was part of Allan Border’s side that triumphed in Kolkata in World Cup 1987 final, Dharmasena and Mahanama played in the World Cup 1996 final .
In addition to these four, Crowe represented New Zealand in the 1983 and 1987 World Cups, Broad featured in three matches of the World Cup 1987, Illingworth participated in the final of the World Cup 1992 in Melbourne as well as in the World Cup 1996 and Madugalle played in three World Cups – 1979, 1983 and 1987. The umpires were chosen by the selection panel of Geoff Allardice (ICC General Manager Cricket), Ranjan Madugalle (ICC Chief Match Referee), David Lloyd (former player, coach, umpire and now television commentator) and Srinivas Venkataraghavan. (UNI)
