'Officials tweaked timings after request from India & Windies'

While the Indian cricket board may have been successful in their rush to grab the August September window in the international cricket calendar, their first brush with official cricket in the United States has certainly ended on a bitter note.

The 40-minute delay to the start of the second T20 International between India and the West Indies at Fort Lauderdale, Florida, followed by a 20-minute shower burst ended with the match getting abandoned and India losing the series 0-1.

Until Monday, it was the broadcaster drawing the flak for the delay because a technical failure with the satellite truck had delayed the proceedings at the match venue.

However, on Tuesday, the International Cricket Council clarified that it was, in fact, on request of the two Boards ­BCCI and the West Indies Cricket Board ­ that the match timings were tweaked.

While Star TV, the broadcaster for the game, struggled to get a back-up in place after the satellite truck ­ used for uplinking of the live feed ­ developed a technical failure, it was the call of the two cricket boards to delay the start of the game.

"Taking into account the strategic considerations behind the staging of the two international matches in Florida, the match officials, on the request of the two competing Members, agreed to tweak the playing hours to allow the host broadcaster to overcome the technical difficulties," an ICC spokesperson said in reply to a specific query in this regard.

Sources say Star has been extremely apologetic about the entire sequence of events but in the end "it wasn't their call to interfere with the match timings".

When asked for a specific query , post the ICC statement, if the two Boards had indeed requested match officials to delay the start of the game, both BCCI and WICB were yet to comment until late on Tuesday night.

The ICC regulations for international Twenty20 playing conditions stipulate that "the captains shall toss for the choice of innings, on the field of play and in the presence of the ICC Match Referee, who shall supervise the toss.

"The toss shall take place not earlier than 30 minutes, nor later than 15 minutes before the scheduled or any re-scheduled time for the match to start."

In the case of Sunday's game, the toss had taken place after which the decision to delay the start of the match was taken.