(ESPN) Sir Ronnie Flanagan, who has served as the ICC anti-corruption unit (ACU) independent chair since 2010, has decided to retire end of October. The development comes on the heel of ACU head Alex Marshall deciding to retire in November.
A highly respected senior cop, Flanagan was the Home Office chief inspector of constabulary for England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and was previously the chief constable of the police service of Northern Ireland. He had replaced Lord Paul Condon, who had stepped down in 2010 having served for 10 years as ACU’s inaugural head.
It was Condon who had originally set up the ACU after he was appointed by ICC in 2000 with the primary task of cleaning up the growing incidents of match-fixing around the time – resulting in life bans for three international captains in Mohammad Azharuddin, Saleem Malik, and the late Hansie Cronje – and setting up guardrails to ensure the sport could ward off corrupt elements.
As he was nearing his exit, Condon had warned that T20 cricket, especially domestic franchise cricket, “represented the biggest challenge to the integrity of cricket”. Right on cue, the IPL corruption scandal broke in 2013. Addressing the ICC annual conference that June, Flanagan told the heads of all the cricket boards to adopt stronger anti-corruption laws to prosecute players, match-officials and franchise owners found guilty of corrupt practices in domestic T20 leagues to avoid a repeat.
On Monday the ICC said in a release they’re aiming to put forward their “recommendation” for the next ACU chair by the quarterly round of meetings in October.
