Australian board defends its silence on assault charge

The Australian board has defended its policy in handling matters relating to sexual assaults despite failing to alert the Pakistani officials about the rape allegation levelled against one of their players. Peter Young, Cricket Australia's public affairs manager, admitted that he had been informed of the allegation two weeks ago while "comparing notes" with the Victorian police force on dealing with sexual-assault claims.

The meeting between Young and the police force was held after a manager from the Centre Against Sexual Assault - the crisis centre which the woman (who claimed she was the victim) contacted to lodge her complaint - had enquired about the boards' procedure to deal with sexual-assault claims. Young said that though Cricket Australia had been informed of the allegation, the Pakistan team management weren't alerted as the board was extremely busy with organising the charity game for the tsunami relief victims.

"Clearly, we should have told them [Pakistan]," Young told The Sun Herald. "I was told by this police officer, who was telling me about a third-hand conversation that no one was supposed to hear about. It is no excuse for not acting on other stuff, but the urgent priority was sorting out the tsunami match. If this happened in the off-season, it would have been handled in 30 minutes.

Inzamam-ul-Haq, the Pakistan captain, asserted that the recent events hadn't affected the team's preparation for the VB Series clash with Australia at the SCG. Inzamam termed the allegation as "a story" and added, "Everything is OK so far and we are looking forward. I think there's nothing in it, there's nothing officially complained [about] and the boys are not taking it seriously."