Hair to charge racial discrimination against ICC in Oct 1 hearing

Sydney, Sep 3 (UNI) Controversial Australian umpire Darrell Hair is all set to allege racial discrimination against the International Cricket Council (ICC) for sacking him from its elite panel in next month's tribunal hearing in London.

The hearing in Hair's case will be held in the London Central Employment Tribunal from October 1 which may run up to 10 days, with the ICC indicating it could call up to 20 witnesses, 'The Australian' reported.

This was confirmed after negotiations between Hair and international cricket's governing body broke down completely.

In a staggering decision, the ICC's executive board, comprising of ten Test-playing nations, voted him out of the international panel after the famous 'Oval fiasco' in August last year citing reason that they had lost confidence in him, despite the fact that the ICC's umpiring department has rated him as one of the best in the world.

The Aussie umpire and his fellow colleague Billy Doctrove forfeited the Oval Test and awarded to England after Pakistan refused to play on in protest at being charged with ball tampering.

Hair's non-popularity with the subcontinental countries was also fired up after he no-balled spin wizard Muttiah Muralidaran seven times for throwing during Boxing Day Test in Melbourne in 1995 .

The newspaper, however, reported that in next month's hearing, Hair would allege racial discrimination on the basis that while his international umpiring career has been ruined by the decision, costing him about 120,000 dollar a year in match fees, his partner-in-crime Doctrove has got a let off from the ICC as he still continues to umpire international matches.

When told about the hearing, Hair seemed guarded, saying, ''I can confirm the case has been set down for October 1 and I have arranged my travel to be there.'' ''I look forward to this matter being over and done with, so my wife and I can get on with our lives,'' he added.

He also seemed non-committal about his future plans after he preferred to remain silent on whether he would continue umpiring in Australia's state cricket this season.

UNI