SA Pull Out Citing Threat To Players

The tri-nation series today collapsed with theSouth African team pulling out of the tournament citing security concerns,leaving India and Sri Lanka to feature in a three-match bilateral series.

After three days of hectic parleys and constant security reviews followingMonday's powerful bomb blast near the team hotels, the South Africans finallytook the decision to abandon the tour dealing a big blow to the organisers whohad drawn up a revised schedule.

The Indians, who have no problems with the security scenario, will stay back toplay a three-match series against the hosts beginning on Friday. All the threematches will be day affairs at the Sinhalese Sports Club with the other twomatches scheduled for August 20 and 22.

The Sri Lanka Cricket Board media coordinator Samantha Algame announced SouthAfrica's withdrawal at a press conference here, ending the suspense over theirparticipation in the tournament.

The CEO of Cricket South Africa, Gerald Majola told a press conference inJohannesburg that the team called off the tour following reports by theirsecurity analysts.

He said it was a "sad decision" but they had to take action tosafeguard the players. The team would return home immediately.

Majola said "In the light of this independentreport by the Olive Group, who were appointed at the behest of the ICC, we haveno alternative but to bring the team home as soon as possible. The independentreport comes to the same conclusion as that of our own security consultant'sreport."

Justifying the pull out, Majola said the report hadtalked about an "unacceptable" level of risk for the players.

"The Olive Group report says, inter alia, that the current risk to the teamis at an unacceptable level, and the Sri Lankan Government is unable toguarantee the physical security of the team given the current security situationin Colombo."

The report said there was no evidence of any targetted threat to the SouthAfrican team, and it assessed that the Tamil Tigers would not directly targetthem.

"However, the report says there is a real situational threat to theteam," Majola said.

He said the decision to withdraw the team was taken with reluctance and regretbut for them players' safety was foremost. "However, the safety of our teamis paramount and we have no option but to withdraw the team from thetournament."

Majola also said CSA would discuss with SLC about rescheduling of thetri-series.

"We have a wonderful relationship with Sri Lankan cricket and will now betalking to them about rescheduling the tournament.

"We have been in touch with both the ICC and SriLankan Cricket and informed them of our decision and the reasons behindit," Majola said.

The series had run into rough weather from the verybeginning as the bomb blast in a busy shopping arcade came hours before thescheduled start of the tournament which has not seen a single ball being bowledyet because of inclement weather.

The South Africans, who were keen to return home after the incident, had agreedto extend the stay in the bomb-hit Colombo pending a fresh security evaluationby an independent agency commissioned by the International Cricket Council.

Security for all the three teams had been beefed up following the blast but mostof the senior South African players had expressed a desire to return home. 

PTI