By News18,Rudransh Khurana
Copyright news18
USA Cricket (USAC) has reportedly filed for Bankruptcy just minutes before its scheduled hearing in its dispute with American Cricket Enterprises (ACE). According to Cricbuzz, the declaration paused the hearings. It is the first known incident of any International Cricket Council (ICC) board taking the extreme move.
ACE, the parent company of the country’s biggest T20 competition, Major League Cricket (MLC), sued USAC over ‘improper termination’ of their contract. They were commercial partners since May 2019, but USAC ended it earlier this year, saying ACE had failed to ‘fulfill its contractual and fiduciary obligations’, including payments due to the national team and support staff. ACE disputed it and said it had offered more than the agreed amount.
ACE condemned the USAC’s decision.
“USAC could not bear for the preliminary injunction hearing to even begin, and knew the result was a forgone conclusion: it had no basis to terminate the parties’ agreement and was recklessly imperiling the success of cricket in the U.S. USAC has zero regard for the best interests of cricket and its players, and is only motivated by politics and its directors’ personal agendas”, an ACE representative said, as quoted by the website.
Current player contracts, including those with senior internationals, are now under Chapter 11, meaning payments could be delayed or changed by the court. The report said the ACE offered to keep paying if USAC agreed to a temporary injunction so their agreement could move forward, but USAC refused.
Earlier, ICC and the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC) had asked the USAC Board to resign for reforms and to restore ICC funding, but the board declined. This comes after board director Anj Balasu was recalled, and bankruptcy was discussed as leverage against the ICC. The next steps remain uncertain.
Apart from running the MLC, the ACE also runs the second-tier development league, Minor League Cricket, and owns the ground that houses the High Performance Centre at Grand Prairie in Dallas, Texas.
