No confirmation of players arriving, tournament could be delayed
After keeping Bangladesh waiting for days Pakistan has finally played its Bangladesh Premier League card on Tuesday confirming that it is unable to send its players for the Twenty20 tournament.
The decision puts the future of the tournament in doubt as it left some of the franchisees without even eleven players to form a team.
The BPL governing council was convinced until the afternoon that Pakistanis would come before they surrendered without giving any proper explanation to media.
BPL governing council secretary Ismail Haider Mallick told reporters in the afternoon that at least six Pakistani players will arrive on Wednesday and the eight others
will follow them on the next day.
Nadeem Sarwar, the spokesman of the Pakistan Cricket Board, however, refused to confirm it when contacted and rather requested the media to contact with Mallick for
the details of the development.
‘You better ask him (Mallick) how they will play,’ Nadeem told New Age over phone.
‘I am not in a position to speak about if any No Objection Certificate was issued or not,’ he said.
The BPL governing council later in a meeting decided to wait until 10am today before deciding further course of action.
It was assumed that Pakistan Cricket Board would release at least some players who are not under contract with them, but PCB chairman indicated that there is a chance
no one would be coming.
A desperate franchisee official contacted directly with Zaka Ashraf using his personal relationship with the grudging cricket administrator, but only got a negative
reply from him.
Unless Bangladesh announces a confirmed date Zaka said they will not release any player. Bangladesh on Monday told Pakistan that they will send a security delegation
to see if the national team can tour to their troubled country, but it seems the PCB is not satisfied with this mere promise.
Pakistan’s position was cleared once some players refused to confirm their arrival timing despite the franchisees sending them air tickets.
One franchisee said it will be difficult for them to field a team at the moment if Pakistanis do not come.
‘I think it will be damaging for us as we have got seven players and even a Pakistani coach Naveed Anjum,’ said a Khulna Royal Bengals official.
Khulna have seven Pakistani players – Shoaib Malik, Umar Akmal, Awaiz Zia, Umar Amin, Ahmed Shehzad, Haris Sohail, Bilawal Bhatti.
The Pakistani players are not the only headache for the BPL governing council as the member secretary admitted that they have failed to make a proper preparation for
the cash-rich tournament.
‘I admit that we could not complete the preparation yet,’ said BPL secretary Mallick. ‘It is because most of our time were consumed clearing the payments of the first
edition,’ said Mallick.
The mismanagement was evident in picking up a bank for ticket selling which could not be started even on Wednesday. Mallick admitted that at least four banks have
backed out and hoped United Commercial Bank Limited would to the job for them finally.
‘The Banks are not prepared to sell the tickets due to security reasons as four banks have backed out,’ said Mallick. ‘We are hopeful UCBL will sell the tickets from
tomorrow,’ he added.
-With New Age input
