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Warne's tsunami charity fails to deliver

23/12/2006 06:08:12 AM Comments (0)

A charity set up by retiring Test cricketer Shane Warne has failed to deliver the $50,000 it promised for the reconstruction of a Sri Lankan cricket ground wrecked by a tsunami.

The Shane Warne Foundation (SWF) told Sri Lanka's Galle International Cricket Club in June the cost of producing fundraising wristbands had been greater than the amount collected, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.

Fewer than 5,000 of the $3 bands had been sold, the foundation said.

As a result, no money would be sent to help rebuild the ground where Warne earned his 500th Test wicket, according to an email from the charity to the club.

"We have not even seen a penny," club director and former Test cricketer Jayananda Warnaweera told the newspaper. "I will give them three months to deliver. Otherwise I will sue."

The foundation has changed management since June but new manager Helen Nolan acknowledged the Sri Lankan club had not benefited from the fundraiser.

Ms Nolan said it was a profit-sharing exercise that unfortunately did not generate any profit.

But she said a massive publicity surrounding a recent visit by Warne to Sri Lanka had led to a $200,000 grant for sporting programs for the children of two villages from the Laureus World Sports Academy's Laureus Sport for Good Foundation.

Ms Nolan also said the SWF was planning an announcement on Boxing Day but would not reveal the details.

The announcement will come on the second anniversary of the tsunami that devastated the Galle ground when it swamped the main stadium as high as the grandstand's second storey.

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