Email This Article To Someone!

BILLY Bowden and Aleem Dar, fresh from officiating in the last two Tests of the England-West Indies series where they received excellent reports, will be based in Belfast for the next nine days covering the Ireland, India and South Africa games.

Bowden is in the middle today for Ireland's game against India, with England's Mark Benson and tomorrow the New Zealander will team up with the Pakistani official for the host nation's game with South Africa. Benson will umpire all three India-South Africa games next week, the first and third with Dar and the second with Bowden.

However, both Bowden and Dar have been suspended from taking part in the ICC World Twenty20 in South Africa in September. Both umpires, along with Steve Bucknor and Rudi Koetzen and match referee Jeff Crowe were yesterday stood down for the two-week tournament for their part in the farcical conclusion to the World Cup final.

“It would have been easy to let sleeping dogs lie and pretend nothing happened,” said ICC chief executive officer Malcolm Speed.

"But the reality is that the playing control team made a serious and fundamental error that caused the final of our flagship event to end in disarray and confusion.

“That was not acceptable for such experienced and talented officials and although we do not like to have to take such action, we felt it was necessary to decline to appoint them for our next event, the ICC World Twenty20 in South Africa."

The match officials incorrectly ruled that, after a stoppage for bad light, the match would have to be completed the following day, even though the minimum 20 overs in the second innings had already been bowled.