There seems to be no sync between the PCB officials and the Director of High Performance, Aaqib Javed — who has slammed the growing influence of the T20 franchise leagues for destroying Pakistan’s cricket overall. Javed made a few comments as to how Pakistan cricket has been on a decline due to the same, which is in complete contrast to the board’s actions — who gave an NOC to 14 players to appear in the Global Super League and the CPL.
Pakistan are ranked 7th in the Tests — were ranked 8th at one point. In ODIs, they are at the 5th spot, and despite playing so many T20s, they are 6th in the T20Is as well. Speaking on the ARY News program ‘Sports Room’, Aaqib said that nations like Pakistan, Sri Lanka and West Indies were the most affected.
“A player who plays around 90 T20 matches in a year and does not play even a single first-class match will naturally move away from red-ball cricket. If players are not playing first-class cricket, how can their performances in the longer format improve?” he said. The veteran also revealed that the PCB had to do away with the A category in the central contracts since there weren’t any players who were doing well in the Tests.
“We cannot award A-category contracts simply for the sake of it. The performances are not there,” he added. “If you ask players, they say they are not focused on playing Test cricket. Look at what is happening in the West Indies, South Africa, Sri Lanka and Australia. Beyond their first three fast bowlers, they struggle to find quality replacements,” he said.
PCB grants 14 NOCs for GSL & CPL
It was just on Friday, that the PCB granted 14 NOCs for the upcoming GSL and CPL. The players include — Mohammed Haris, Shahab Khan, Mohammad Naeem, Abdullah Shafique, Farhan Yousaf, Shamyl Hussain, Mehran Mumtaz, Usman Khan, Ali Shabbir, Mohammad Farooq, Mohammad Imran, Mohammad Basit and Khalil Ahmed. From Pakistan, Lahore Qalandars will feature in the tournament.
The granting of NOCs in bulk is contrary to the views of Aaqib Javed, who holds an important position, in the current setup of the Pakistani team. This only goes on to show, that just like the players, even the board values the money that comes from the foreign leagues.
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