ICC Americas Office which was based in Toronto, Canada for many years has found a new home in the USA.
The historic reasons for this was largely been based around convenience as opposed to strategy, with previous Regional Development Managers being from Toronto.
In recent years, ICC Americas have shared an office with Cricket Canada in the Ontario Sports Alliance building, however, the Sports Alliance stopped providing office space support to sports organizations in 2015. At this time, Cricket Canada decided to move to a separate location, with the result that the ICC Americas office is currently located on a temporary basis at the Toronto Blue Jays stadium.
These circumstances, together with the strong strategic desire for the ICC to see cricket develop more rapidly in the USA, resulted in the ICC Executive Committee and Board agreeing in October 2015 that the ICC Americas office should be moved to the USA.
In recent months a due diligence process has taken place to assess potential cities in the USA. A range of US based organizations including Property Consulting Group (ICC’s US based consultant), USA Rugby, the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) and the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) were consulted in this regard.
Excluding the big American professional sports (i.e. NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, MLS), Colorado Springs is the center of sports administration in the USA, hosting close to 30 governing bodies, as well as the USOC. The Colorado Springs Sports Corp has demonstrated a strong desire to host the ICC Americas office, and as part of their support package, we are in discussions about the possibility of developing a new cricket facility in Colorado Springs.
It is anticipated that the Colorado Springs office will commence operations in the next 3-4 months, with more information in this regard to be provided in due course. Recruitment processes to appoint some new ICC Americas staff in the Colorado Springs office will also be announced shortly.