India's rebel Twenty20 league is considering legal action after failing in the latest bid for recognition because of staunch opposition by the Indian board, former India skipper Kapil Dev said on Wednesday. The International Cricket Council (ICC) was unsuccessful in its bid to end a dispute between the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and the Indian Cricket League (ICL) after a meeting held in Johannesburg on Monday proved fruitless. “As a sportsman, I don't like matters of sport being decided in court, but with the talks failing (again), we may have no choice but to take recourse to law,” Kapil Dev, chairman of the Indian Cricket League (ICL), told The Telegraph newspaper. “I can't understand who has given the BCCI the right to be the sole authority for promoting cricket in India ... The ICL too is doing just that, so why should our boys be punished? That, to me, is not justice.” The ICL's application to be recognised as unofficial cricket would now be discussed at the ICC Board meeting in April. The ICL, bankrolled by one of India's largest media firms, launched the league following India's triumph in the inaugural Twenty20 World Cup in 2007. It signed overseas players, particularly from Pakistan, New Zealand and Bangladesh. However the BCCI, concerned the league would undermine its position, refused to recognise it and persuaded other national boards to ban players who signed up. De Villiers not interested in wicket-keeping AB de Villiers is not interested in becoming South Africa's full-time wicketkeeper as he wants to concentrate on becoming the world's best batsman. “I don't want to keep wicket, I want to bat at number four for my country and take the responsibility of scoring hundreds,” De Villiers, who kept wicket at the start of his test career, said on Tuesday. “If I took over the gloves I would have to bat six or seven, and you're not going to be the world's best batsman playing in that position. I want the opportunity to score double hundreds and push my average.” De Villiers sometimes fills in for Mark Boucher in one dayers and there have been suggestions that if he took over the role permanently, it would allow South Africa to include JP Duminy and Ashwell Prince in their batting line-up. But the 25-year-old, who will play his 50th Test when the first Test against Australia begins in Johannesburg on Thursday, said he did not want to experiment with his role in the team. “I'm very happy and proud to play 50 consecutive Tests. I've worked hard to get here and in the next 20 tests I'm going to work on getting my average to 50,” said De Villiers, whose test average currently stands at 41.57. De Villiers said the South Africans would have to be at their best if they were to beat Australia, despite winning the recent series Down Under. “Australia are still very dangerous and can beat any team, any time. We will be focusing on our own games and sticking to the basics, which we'll have to do brilliantly.” De Villiers, who has scored 3201 runs in his 49 tests, said he expected batsmen to have a tough time at the Wanderers. “There's normally a bit more swing here, it favours the bowlers more. So Dale Steyn and the boys should have a good advantage and the batsmen will have to be up to scratch,” De Villiers said. Clarke not to resign England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) chairman Giles Clarke remained defiant over the Allen Stanford scandal on Wednesday, saying the idea of resigning over the affair was not on the agenda.
