The Central Organising Committee (COC) of the 2011 World Cup Tuesday recommended that India should host eight of the 14 cricket matches that were scheduled to take place in Pakistan.

The COC met in Mumbai to provide the ICC Board with a recommendation as to where, within Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka, the 14 matches originally allocated to Pakistan should be staged.

Pakistan, which was removed as one of the host countries by the International Cricket Council (ICC) due to security situations, skipped the COC meeting.

The COC said that Sri Lanka will host the remaining four and Bangladesh two. India will now hosts 29 matches, Sri Lanka 12 and Bangladesh eight.

The COC recommendations will now be forwarded to the ICC Board for final approval. It was also decided that Mumbai will be the secretariat of the tournament. Ratnakar Shetty, Board of Control for Cricket in India’s (BCCI) chief administrative officer, was appointed the tournament director.

“We had a good, productive meeting. There is much hard work to be done but we are confident we are now well on the way, with operational plans in place to become effective from the start of August. Moving forward, the COC will meet on a regular basis with everyone committed to a successful event, something we are confident we can achieve,” Shetty said in a statement.

A total of 13 venues will be used for the tournament with eight of those in India, three in Sri Lanka and two in Bangladesh. All venues for matches will be announced in due course.

Bangladesh will now stage two of the four quarter-finals, and India and Sri Lanka one each. The two semi-finals will be staged in India and Sri Lanka, and the final in India.

The COC also recommended that a security directorate be formed under the chairmanship of BCCI president Shashank Manohar. It also said that a committee under the chairmanship of N.Srinivasan, the BCCI secretary, will take charge of the issues of inspecting venues and pitches. Preliminary inspections are likely to take place in October.

The 2011 World Cup, to be hosted in the sub-continent, was on Tuesday launched with all the fanfare by the International Cricket Council with a member each from most of the previous winners present along with ICC vice-president Sharad Pawar and Chief Executive Haroon Lorgat.

Clive Lloyd, the captain of the West Indies sides that won in 1975 and 1979 in England, India’s 1983 winning-team members Balwinder Sandhu and Dilip Vengsarkar, Sri Lanka’s Aravinda D’Silva who played a major role in the 1996 Cup winning squad and Michael Bevan of Australia who was part of the team that won the crown in 1999 and 2003 were those present.

The sound and laser show that showcased the key moments of all the previous World Cups was a breathtaking affair.

Lorgat sought to dispel fears of One-day format being overtaken by the huge popularity of the Twenty20 version saying that the limited overs World Cup continued to be ICC’s showpiece event.

“The (50-over) World Cup is the flagship event of the ICC. What we have will hold up in the future,” he announced to the audience which had several former Mumbai-based Test cricketers including Ajit Wadekar, Bapu Nadkarni and Umesh Kulkarni.

Lorgat also said that the 2011 World Cup would be over in 40-plus dates and would involve 14 teams.

Pawar, the chairman of the 2011 World Cup Organising Committee, announced that the Indian board has decided to keep the ticket prices at affordable rates to encourage the student community to witness the matches and reiterated that Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium would host the final.

“The Indian board has decided to keep the rates of the tickets low to encourage the student community. We don’t want to make too much money out of gates. This has come after what we saw in the West Indies (during the 2007 World Cup),” he added.

The last World Cup was played in front of a lot of empty seats.

Pawar also said that Pakistan, which would not hold any matches, would continue to be part of the organizational set-up.

“I’m upset that a major partner Pakistan is not organising a match due to unfortunate circumstances. They will be very much part of the organising committee and would help organize the World Cup in a dignified manner,” he said.

Pakistan’s representative — PCB’s cricket operations manager — Zakir Khan took part in the ceremony though he did not attend the meeting of the World Cup Central Organising Committee which preceded it.

Recalling the first two World Cups that he guided the West Indies to victory as captain, Lloyd said in 1975 the limited overs game was in its infancy and to that extent his team can be considered as the pioneers of driving it forward.

“The West Indies has a population of only five million people and to be crowned the best in the world was an achievement,” he said.

Sandhu brought the roof down with his comments that the biggest mistake that Lloyd and his men made while playing against India in the final at the Lord’s in June 1983 was to hit him on the head with a bouncer.

“The biggest mistake that the West Indies made was to hit a ‘Sardar’ on the head with a bouncer. Now we have two Sardars in the Indian team, Yuvraj Singh (who was part of the audience) and Harbhajan Singh. And Sachin Tendulkar wants to be part of a World Cup winning squad. If he remains fit India will win the next World Cup,” he said.

Sandhu said that the 1983 title triumph was a turning point in Indian cricket as it gave the players the confidence that they can beat the best in the world.

“We then went on to win the Benson and Hedges World Championships in Australia in 1985 and the Twenty20 World Championship (in 2007),” he recollected.

He also said that he has kept the winners’ medal in his safe. “It’s a very precious thing for me,” he pointed out.

Aravinda, who played a match-winning knock of 100 besides taking three wickets in the 1996 final at Lahore against Australia, considered both the feats with the bat and ball as important and complimented the entire team led by Arjuna Ranatunga for the triumph.

“It was a great team effort. We had a strong batting line up with the openers (Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana) followed by Roshan (Mahanama), Asanka (Gurusinha) and Arjuna which gave me the opportunity to play my natural game,” he said.

Bevan, considered among the finest finishers the one-day game has seen, said that though he batted at number six like Yuvraj Singh had done for India earlier, their batting styles were different.

“We had to win seven games in a row and we treated every game as a final,” he recalled about Australia’s performance in the 1999 World Cup held in England.

He also remembered the sad part of losing seven shirts with the autographs of players when he returned home. “I had kept the coffin (kit bag) outside as I did not want to spoil the new white carpet at my home. When I returned to pick it up it had been stolen,” he said.

Asked about the winners’ medal, Bevan said it was in his garage.

Addressing the media after the formal launch of the 2011 World Cup, Lorgat ruled out any further possibility of Pakistan still hosting any matches but re-iterated that the PCB will get the hosting fees.

“No possibility (of hosting any match). Pakistan can choose to hold the World Cup with the other three hosting boards,” Lorgat said.

“The decision (to pay Pakistan hosting fees) was taken by all the four co-hosts and even the Pakistan representative was present. They will get three quarter million US dollars per match for 14 matches,” he said.

On Pakistan going to court after it was stripped of 2011 WC hosting rights, Lorgat said, “I think perhaps they are not that well advised. They should be engaged in dialogue to sort out the issues and not get into legal issues.”

The ICC CEO said the Champions Trophy will be held every four years after this year’s edition in September and the Twenty20 World Championship will be held in April 2010 to get the scheduling right.

He said Twenty20 World Cup will not overshadow limited overs World Cup. “You cannot compare the World Cup with the T20 World Cup,” he said.

Prof Shetty said Wankhede Stadium renovation work will be completed by October 2010 and it will start hosting matches in December 2010-January 2011.

Pakistan’s intent to seek legal recourse on hosting rights issues may have cast a shadow on the 2011 World Cup but the ICC, on Monday, made it clear that there was no risk of the event being shifted out of the Indian sub-continent.

Pakistan’s share of 14 matches has been allotted to other three co-hosts and the strife-torn country has threatened to take legal action against the move.

As the ICC gears up for the tussle, the governing body’s President David Morgan said that it would not impact the hosting of the event in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

Asked specifically whether the seemingly prolonged dispute could result in the World Cup being shifted out of South Asia, Morgan said, “No, I don’t believe that the 2011 ICC World Cup will be shifted away from the Indian sub-continent.”

Morgan insisted that Pakistan continues to have the hosting rights of the matches and would be entitled to the fees.

“I think it’s important to emphasise that Pakistan has lost none of its hosting rights. All the hosting rights they had, they remain entitled to them. However it has been decided that none of the matches would be staged in Pakistan,” he said.

Matches were taken away from Pakistan after a series of terror attacks in the country, including the one on the Sri Lankan cricket team, which left six of the visiting players injured.

Morgan also ruled out organising Pakistan’s share of matches at a neutral venue, an idea floated by the Pakistan Cricket Board, making it clear that the games would be shared by the remaining three co-hosts.

“The ICC Commercial Board has decided that all the matches scheduled originally in Pakistan would be hosted by other co-hosts, that is Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India,” he said.

Asked what the ICC would do in case of prolonged legal battle with the PCB, Morgan said, “Well, I can’t discuss that at this stage.”

Pakistan is also not too happy with the draft Future Tours Programme (FTP) and has accused India and Australia of sidelining it by not scheduling any bilateral series.

But Morgan said there was no such intent on BCCI’s part and the Indian Board was tied down by certain restrictions.

“BCCI clearly has some restrictions on it in playing bilateral tours in Pakistan. What I’m concerned about is that a cricketing nation, as powerful as Pakistan, should not be isolated”, he said.

“I firmly believe the ICC should do everything possible that FTP puts Pakistan in its rightful place as a powerful and influential cricketing nations,” Morgan assured.

Morgan said international cricket is incomplete without Pakistan.

“We cannot ignore the fact that Pakistan has produced some of the most talented and attractive players over the last 20 years and it’s inconceivable that international cricket could prosper without Pakistan playing its full part,” he said.

Asked when he expected teams to agree to tour Pakistan, where security has been a perennial concern, the 71-year-old administrator said, “Not in the foreseeable future.”

“There has to be a significant change in Pakistan for the ICC and the visiting cricketing nations to be convinced that Pakistan is the place to play cricket”, he added.

Sri Lanka’s veteran batsman Sanath Jayasuriya turns 40 on Tuesday, with a vow to carry on until the 2011 World Cup despite his being the oldest cricketer still playing at the top level.

“Age is not a problem, it is how you stay mentally and physically fit to remain on top of the game, to try out new variations in the bat and ball,” Jayasuriya said.

The dashing batsman, who also bowls left-arm spin, made his international debut against Australia in Melbourne in 1989 and won praise as an all-rounder during Sri Lanka’s victorious World Cup campaign in 1996.

Jayasuriya is only the second batsman after India’s Sachin Tendulkar to pass 13,000 runs in One-Day Internationals. He is also the oldest batsman to score a one-day century, at 39 years and 212 days.

“I don’t really worry about records anymore these days,” the left-hander said. “I focus on putting runs on the board, to help the team win matches.”

Jayasuriya retired from Test matches in 2007, but continues to shine in the physically challenging shorter version of the game, determined to prove he has a few more miles left on the clock.

The short but powerfully-built batsman is virtually unstoppable when on song, and scored freely during the recent World Twenty20 in England where Sri Lanka won six successive matches before losing to Pakistan in the final.

Jayasuriya said the emergence of talented young players meant he could never take his place for granted in the national team.

“Playing with youngsters is extra hard these days,” said the all-rounder who led Sri Lanka from 1999 to April 2003.

“There is an abundance of raw talent constantly knocking at the door for a berth in the team. And that puts pressure on me. I have to perform to retain my place.”

However, he added, life is not easy for younger players, either.

“They also need to live up to expectations, sometimes the pressure on them is much more than what it was when I was starting out,” he said.

Jayasuriya announced his retirement in 2006, but made a comeback during Sri Lanka’s tour of England that year.

Now he does not talk of quitting and Sri Lankan skipper Kumar Sangakkara said he has left the decision with Jayasuriya.

“Sanath is a match winner and as long as he’s fit and willing to play for us, we are happy to have him in the side,” said Sangakkara.

“He has won us a lot of matches and I am sure he will win a lot of games as well for us in the future.”

Asked if he will play the World Cup to be held in the sub-continent in 2011, Jayasuriya said: “I would love to. I am taking each series at a time. Hopefully I will get there.”

His next outing will be against World Twenty20 champions Pakistan, who will play five One-Day Internationals and a Twenty20 game after the three-Test series that starts in Sri Lanka on July 4.

“Pakistan has variety in batting and bowling and we are also working on a few things. Let’s see, it should be an interesting contest,” said Jayasuriya.

Matches in the 2011 World Cup due to be staged in Pakistan will not take place in the United Arab Emirates, International Cricket Council president David Morgan said on Thursday.

Instead the 14 fixtures will, despite the wishes of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), take place in the three Indian sub-continent co-host nations of India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

Morgan said the Dubai-based ICC had looked at staging matches in a “fifth country”, amidst speculation that matches could be shifted to the UAE.

But he told reporters at Lord’s on Thursday: “The (ICC) board has considered that but it has decided the 14 matches originally allocated to Pakistan should take place in the three other Indian sub-continent countries of the Full Members, that is India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.”

How many games will be played in each of those countries has yet to be decided. The ICC has referred the matter back to the tournament’s central organising committee and Morgan said he expected a decision within a fortnight.

“We need a recommendation from those four host nations, including Pakistan. They will come forward with the location of those matches to the commercial board of the ICC.”

Asked how long it would take for the ICC to receive that decision, Morgan said: “I would expect two weeks.”

The ICC ruled out matches in violence-hit Pakistan following the militant attack on the Sri Lankan team bus in Lahore on March 3 while it was on its way to the Gadaffi stadium to resume a Test match.

But Pakistan, who last weekend beat Sri Lanka in the World Twenty20 final at Lord’s, remains a co-host of the World Cup.

Morgan, flanked by ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat, stressed the PCB, who have taken legal action against the ICC, would still receive a hosting fee of 750,000 dollars per match – 10.5 million dollars in total.

Morgan, formerly chairman of the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), said the failure to announce where the games would be played was not down to the PCB’s legal action.

“When two parties are at odds, it is often difficult to reach a settlement,” he said.

“We are not given up hope of reaching a settlement but I couldn’t go into any more detail than that. The legal action doesn’t help but I don’t think it make it any more difficult.”

Following last year’s Mumbai terror attacks, security concerns have also been expressed regarding the safety of India as a venue for international cricket while a long-running civil war in Sri Lanka has only recently ended.

But Morgan said Pakistan’s case was not comparable to that of its Asian neighbours.

“The situation in Pakistan is different. The tragic happenings in Lahore when a cricket team was targeted and the player control team was targeted, that changed the landscape of safety and security in cricket, in sport generally and in terms of sporting events of an international nature in Pakistan.”

The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) is hoping that its mutual understanding with the Board of Cricket Control in India’s former chief, Sharad Pawar, would help it resolve the 2011 World Cup hosting rights issues with the International Cricket Council (ICC).

Sources privy to the PCB chief Ijaz Butt said that he is banking on the understandings reached with Pawar to resolve the hosting rights issues with the ICC, when all the top officials of major cricket playing nations meet in London on June 19.

“The PCB voted in favour of Sharad Pawar for ICC president post, and Chairman Ijaz Butt has every reason to be optimistic,” a source close to PCB chief said.

However, some of the sources said that the PCB would not change its earlier stand over hosting the matches, and certainly not agree to receive hosting fee without getting any game.

“The PCB is not asking for any favour. They may not agree to receive only the hosting fees without organizing the allotted matches. The PCB is also likely to deny the offer of free hosting Pakistan matches in India and other countries,” The Nation quoted sources, as saying.

The PCB has even put forth plans to host its share of matches in the UAE, rather than relocating them to the other three hosting countries India, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh.

According to the sources, the PCB might agree to host a reduced number of matches, and it would retain hosting fees for the other matches it agrees to concede to the other host countries.

The ICC had stripped Pakistan of the hosting rights of mega-event citing security reasons following the brazen terror attacks on the visiting Sri Lanka cricket team in Lahore in March.

Later, the PCB launched a legal battle against the game’s apex authority, which forced the other three host nations and the ICC to discuss and resolve the issue.

Australia would be ready to host matches in the 2011 World Cup following the attack on the Sri Lankan team in Pakistan, Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland said Wednesday.

But he stressed that he would prefer the tournament to go ahead as planned in Pakistan, as well as India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

The International Cricket Council (ICC) cast doubt Tuesday on Pakistan’s hopes of remaining a co-host of the four-yearly event, saying the Lahore attacks had changed the global landscape of the game.

“Officially, we are the standby hosts for the 2011 World Cup – our strong preference is for the event to go ahead in Asia, hosted by the countries that the ICC sees fit,” Sutherland was quoted as saying by Australian Associated Press.

“We’re the hosts for 2015 and we’re confident we can put on a fantastic event… but we want the appropriate lead time into that event because of all the planning considerations necessary for it.”

New Zealand are also standby hosts for the 2011 World Cup.

The ICC’s board will discuss the fallout from the Lahore ambush — which killed eight people and left seven Sri Lankan cricketers wounded – and the consequences for the World Cup at a meeting in Dubai next month.

Sri Lanka fast bowler Chaminda Vaas wants to quit international cricket after playing in the 2011 World Cup.

”It will be my last World Cup and I am confident to get back (into the ODI team),” Vaas said on Tuesday. The 34-year-old left-arm fast bowler has lost his place in the Sri Lanka ODI squad for the last six months since playing against India at home in August.

”I am playing three-day and ODI matches in domestic cricket and want to comeback in the ODIs, too,” Vaas said.

In the absence of Vaas, fast bowlers Thilan Thushara and Nuwan Kulasekara have been regularly performing well in the limited-overs game.

”We have a good fast bowlers academy and we have some good fast bowlers coming up,” Vaas said.

The ICC on Tuesday revealed Bangladesh would host the opening ceremony of the 2011 World Cup on 19 February 2011 after representatives met in New Delhi to discuss tournament planning.

Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka will jointly host the event and participants at the meeting, who included ICC Chief Executive Haroon Lorgat, elected to make the tournament shorter than the one the West Indies organised in 2007.

“I am pleased to see that planning arrangements are gathering speed,” said Lorgat.

“It is no secret that from an organisational point of view we are a little behind the clock at the moment but I’m pleased to say the pace has now quickened and the various parties are stepping up to deliver what I fully believe will be a great celebration of world cricket,” he said.

“One of the issues to arise from today’s meeting was that of safety and security,” said Lorgat.

“Clearly, that is a major factor to consider and we are already making provisions to ensure that players, officials, media, spectators and all other stakeholders will be safe during the event. In fact, people’s safety is our number-one priority.”

Earlier this year, the International Cricket Council (ICC) decided to relocate the 2009 Champions Trophy, the biggest one-day tournament in world cricket after the World Cup, from Pakistan due to lingering fears over the security situation in the troubled nation.

An alternative venue is expected to be announced at the next ICC executive board meeting in April in Dubai. But the Pakistanis are still on board for 2011, Lorgat stressed.

“I think it would be premature to start talking of alternative venues for the event…. At this stage we are planning for the ICC Cricket World Cup to take place in the four designated countries as originally planned.”

Lorgat added that the ICC would soon appoint an independent security assessor.

As part of the preparations for the tournament, the ICC Cricket World Cup Qualifier will take place in South Africa from April 1 to 19, the ICC noted.

The 12-team Qualifier features the best teams from the Associate and Affiliate world with the top four sides winning places at the big event in 2011. The 10 Full Members of the ICC have already qualified automatically.

Aware of the turmoil in Pakistan, the International Cricket Council on Tuesday asked organisers of the 2011 World Cup to consider shifting venues to another city, even to another country, if situation so demands.

Addressing a press conference after the meeting of the 2011 World Cup Central Organising Committee here, ICC CEO Haroon Lorgat said the turmoil in Pakistan was a “consideration” for the governing body which asked the organisers to consider alternate venues in case of an emergency.

“It’s a consideration that we have to give attention to. This is not something we discussed today, except to ask the organisers to consider alternate host city venues within the country as well as alternate country venues in the event of something is not favourable in one of the particular host countries,” Lorgat said.

India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh will jointly host the event.

Lorgat, however, felt there was still enough time in hand and there was no need to press the panic button.

“I think it’s still a long way off to World Cup. It is certainly a consideration to keep note of but it’s way too early to be already concerned at this particular stage,” he added.

Reminded about visiting teams’ reluctance to tour Pakistan and whether he was optimistic about a marked change in the situation in the trouble-torn country, Lorgat said,” I’m optimistic by nature. But at the same time, I’m no crystal ball gazer.

“But we are monitoring the situation regularly and we recently got the Board to support that ICC’s Anti-Corruption and Security Unit (ACSU) would take on the extra responsibility of monitoring security on an ongoing basis.”

Lorgat said of the 15 World Cup venues, eight would be in India, four in Pakistan, two in Sri Lanka and one in Bangladesh.

Lorgat said ICC was in touch with the Indian Premier League Chairman Lalit Modi on deploying ACSU officials during the IPL.

“We are in discussion with Mr Modi. They are keen to have ACSU officials in IPL and we also feel it makes sense,” he said.

Representatives from all the members boards, including Pakistan Cricket Board President Ejaj Butt and CEO Saleem Altaf, BCCI Secretary N Srinivasan, Chief Administrative Officer Ratnakar Shetty, Sri Lankan cricket board CEO Duleep Mendis and Bangladesh Cricket Board officials attended the meeting presided by Organising Committee Chairman Sharad Pawar.

ICC Principal Adviser IS Bindra was also present in the meeting.

The committee appointed Salim Butt of Pakistan as the Managing Director, while setting up a number of working groups to work out the details “so that we can deliver a successful, world class event,” Lorgat said.

The ICC official seemed unperturbed by the snapping of cricket ties between India and Pakistan and didn’t foresee it affecting organisation of the World Cup.

“This issue must be approached with an optimistic viewpoint, certainly because we still have some time in our hand. I think it’s way too early to be presumptuous and assume that things won’t work.

“When we come close to the event, obviously we have to pay much more attention to the issues like safety, security and relation between the countries. But I can assure you at this stage we are planning a World Cup in all the four countries,” he said.

Lorgat accepted the criticism of the 2007 World Cup for being too long and said ICC this time was looking at an event which would not go beyond six weeks after its scheduled February 19, 2011 start.

“We are planning to reduce the time-span, not to go beyond the six-week period. The last two weeks of February and March. We are looking to shorten the period down to six weeks,” he said.

“We want a shorter and sharper tournament not beyond six weeks and if my memory serves me right, not more than 49 games,” he said.

Taking stock of the progress made so far, Lorgat said the organisers were still running behind schedule and had some catch-up job ahead of them.

“There is an acknowledgment that we are little late than we would have liked. This is again why Mr Pawar is driving all forces so that planning and operational issues get underway. We have got some work to catch up with,” he said.