May 16, 2008	Friday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 10, 1429

LONDON, May 15: New international cricket chief Haroon Lorgat said on Wednesday it was important that the expanding Twenty20 format did not begin to dominate the Test and 50-over game.

South African Lorgat, who will become the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) chief executive in July, said Test cricket must remain the leading format in the sport.

“I sat in on the ICC cricket committee meeting this month and they were very clear that Test cricket should remain the pinnacle of the game and I agree,” Lorgat said in a telephone interview on Wednesday.

Twenty20, which began in England in 2003, is making rapid progress as the game’s most popular format and since the inaugural ICC Twenty20 World Cup in September, a slew of Twenty20 events have surfaced.

The unofficial Indian Cricket League began, the officially-backed Indian Premier League started last month and there is talk of England, West Indies and Pakistan expanding their own domestic Twenty20 competitions to exploit the wave of international popularity in the event.

“It’s a form of the game we can use as a wonderful opportunity to grow cricket globally, though we will have to manage the load that Twenty20 takes on against Test and 50-over cricket,” Lorgat said.

“We are seeing a lot of Twenty20 now because the IPL is going on but like most things that are new, you see an explosion of interest at first and then things settle down.

“We might be having too much of it at first but I hope going forward we can keep a sensible balance between Twenty20 and the other formats.”

Lorgat, 48 this month, is an accountant by profession though has received an advanced cricketing pedigree with various roles within South African cricket, including convenor of selectors for the national team between 2004 and 2007 and treasurer of the cricket board.

He will travel to Dubai next month to try to secure accommodation in the city that will be his new home for at least the next three years.—Reuters