NEW DELHI, July 3: Indian officials have asked the International Cricket Council (ICC) to re-open the issue of captain Saurav Ganguly’s six-match ban and send it to arbitration.

“We have requested the ICC to send the matter for arbitration,” Indian cricket board president Ranbir Mahendra said on Sunday.

Ganguly was penalised for his team’s slow over rate in two successive games during a 4-2 defeat in a one-day series at home against Pakistan in April.

An appeal by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) against match referee Chris Broad’s decision was quashed by appeals commissioner Michael Beloff.

Although ICC rules say the decision is binding, Mahendra said the board had contested some of the rules as well as the procedures adopted by Beloff.

Ganguly was banned after his team exceeded the allotted time for completing the overs by almost 30 minutes in two consecutive matches. He was fined for the first offence and given the ban in the next game.

The BCCI asked Ganguly to sit out the last two games despite being eligible to play, pending the appeal. The ICC ruled the ban would start retroactively with Ganguly needing to miss four more games, ruling him out of a one-day tri-series in Sri Lanka starting on July 30.—Reuters