England Cricket Team Face Twitter, Facebook Ban

England Cricket Team Face Twitter, Facebook Ban

Techtree News Staff, Aug 23, 2010 1845 hrs IST

New clause in contract may stop players from using social network while on International duty

England Cricket Team players now face a ban on posting on social networks like Twitter and Facebook during their matches. As reported in the Mail, England team captain, Andrew Strauss, supported the team management's thoughts to add a clause in the new England Cricket Board contracts for 2011. Graeme Swann, James Anderson, Kevin Pietersen and Steven Finn are four Brit cricketers who've nearly 150,000 followers combined.

However, the players believe that their social network related activities are a "harmless diversion" with potential for commercial opportunities. How? By frequent mention of sponsors. But the team management wants cricketers to concentrate more on practices as well as performance while they're on international duty.

It seems that the team management is worried about dressing room secrets being exposed to the rest of the world. In the past, former England Under-19 caption Azeem Rafeeq sent derogatory message against then coach John Abrahams after being dropped for the Sri Lanka tour. Rafeeq was fined 500 pounds and banned from cricket for one month.

Professional Cricketers' Association advisors argued that existing regulations on cricketers were enough. If players from other sports also start releasing heat on Twitter and Facebook then soon several sports associations would bar them from using social networks while 'on duty'. We're not sure whether England team sponsors are going to like it but several fans would certainly miss out on interacting with their favorite players. What if BCCI bans Sachin Tendulkar from using Twitter or Facebook?