Take it or leave it. That's the name of the game after the International Cricket Council laid down the law to its recalcitrant second-tier membership, stressing next year's ICC World Twenty20 would be a 12-team tournament, leaving room for only two associates.
'This is cast in stone,' ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat said at the end of the annual conference in Hong Kong yesterday.
While reduced numbers will dent Hong Kong's hopes of qualifying for the World Twenty20, there was good news as far as the 50-overs World Cup in 2015 was concerned, with Lorgat revealing the ICC would stick to the same qualifying process used for the 2011 tournament.
But Lorgat was in uncompromising mood on the World Twenty20 and unwilling to give another inch, a feeling which surely must have been hardened after the world governing body had been forced to back down from its efforts to host a 10-team World Cup (50 overs) in 2015.
Following immense pressure from the associates, the ICC rescinded its decision made two months ago and reinstated a 14-team World Cup similar to this year's showpiece won by India. In return, it cut the World Twenty20 next year in Sri Lanka from 16 teams to 12, reducing associates from six to two.
'We are all unhappy with this decision. They give with one hand and take with the other, and this was the general feeling among the associates. We are resolved to opposing this move,' said Hong Kong Cricket Association secretary John Cribbin, who is also a member of the ICC chief executives' committee representing the associates.
It is understood yesterday's full session, which brought the curtain down on the five-day conference, had been confrontational at times.