Hair to take legal action

Sacked umpire Darrell Hair will take legal action against the ICC, citing racial discrimination after he was fired for his role in the Oval controversy.

The ICC ruled late last year that Darrell Hair would not be able to officiate in any international matches, after his involvement in last year’s Test match debacle between England and Pakistan.

During the match he docked Pakistan five runs for allegedly tampering with the ball, a decision that lead to the touring side forfeiting the match, something that had not happened in Test match history.

Hair was later involved in a further scandal, when he requested the ICC pay him $500,000 in exchange for his resignation.

According to the BBC, Hair feels that he was made a scapegoat during the incident with fellow umpire Billy Doctrove receiving no punishment and still able to umpire matches. He also claims the Pakistan Cricket Board unlawfully induced the ICC to hand out the ban.

The PCB have today reacted angrily to the news. Chairman Dr Nasim Ashraf dismissed the claims completely on BBC Radio, citing mere opportunism on the part of Hair as the cause for the lawsuit.

“I am just simply outraged. I can’t believe it, this is adding insult to injury. Race has nothing to do with this,” he said.

“Mr Hair was removed from the elite panel of umpires by the full ICC board which has many countries including England and Australia which are non-white.

“I am just flabbergasted. This is the most preposterous thing I’ve heard, when our lawyer told me we had received a letter from his solicitors accusing the ICC of racial discrimination and naming the Pakistan Cricket Board as a party to this issue.

“Mr Hair was removed from the ICC panel of umpires because of his bad umpiring and poor judgement.

“I think this is probably another manifestation of Mr Hair’s mental status.

“I daresay it sounds almost as if he’s not only just very impetuous or stubborn, if he made a mistake a man should have stood up and said ‘I made a mistake’.

“For him earlier to have also asked for a half a million dollars during the incident and saying ‘look, give me this money and I will simply walk away’, and now suing the ICC and naming the PCB as a party for racial discrimination, smacks to me of another bit of, perhaps, opportunism.”