PCB names Bari as chief selector while Salahuddin replaces Zaheer Abbas
Decision to appoint a captain and a coach ofthe Pakistan senior team has been deferred to the next Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) council meeting scheduled to be held next month. The PCB council which met in a marathon session under the chairmanship of Khalid Mahmood at the Qadhafi Stadium on Sunday from 2 pm to 9 pm, decided to reshuffle the national senior selection committee and appoint the former Test wicketkeeper Wasim Bari as its new chairman. The post had fallen vacant due to resignation of Test paceman Salim Altaf, who had objected to sending of Wasim Akram as a re-inforcement of Pakistan team to South Africa by chairman Khalid Mahmood.
Interestingly, Shafique Ahmad ``Papa'' has been retained as a member of the committee while Zaheer Abbas has been exclude and in his place former Test selector Salahuddin Ahmad has been brought back as a new member.
However, forming of a new National Junior Selection Committee has also been deferred.
Test batsman Basit Ali has been named as a captain of the Pakistan senior team which will take part in the Super Eight Cricket Tournament to be held at Kuala Lumpur from July 17 to 19. Its manager will be named within a couple of days. Members of the team are:
Shahid Afridi, Salim Elahi, Zahid Fazal, Basit Ali (captain), Javed Qadeer (wicketkeeper), Muhammad Zahid, Abdul Razzaq, Muhammad Husain and Taimur Khan.
Many players have been ignored while naming a 15-member Pakistan under-19 team for a three-month tour of Britain, which will begin this month. Bayazid Khan, son of the PCB chief executive Majid Khan, has been retained as the captain of the team while the youngest-ever Test cricketer Hasan Raza has been appointed as the vice-captain. Former first-class left-arm leg-spinner Abdul Raqueeb will be the manager and former Test batsman Azhar Khan the coach of the team. The 15 members of the Pakistan junior team are:
Bayazid Ahmad Khan (captain), Hasan Raza (vice-captain), Inam-ul-Haq, Hafiz Majid, Taufique Umar, Imran Nazir, Bilal Asad, Humayun Farhat (wicketkeeper), Irfan Fazil, Kashif Raza, Zahid Saeed, Rizwan Fareed, Shoaib Malik, Shakil Nawaz, Zayad Qayyum.
A new disciplinary committee has been formed by the PCB council. Ashraf Qureshi will be its chairman while Mian Munir Ahmad and Wing-Commander Mahmood will be its members.
All the council members were given a copy of accounts of the PCB and asked to give their comments on these atthe next meeting. A finance committee was formed to suggest cut in expenses of the PCB. It will consist of Nusrat azeem and Mian Munir Ahmad.
A PCB development committee was constituted by the house. It will raise a development fund. It will visit all the grounds and stadia in the country and make plans with the help of local administrations for improvement of the venues. The PCB treasurer Hafiz Manzoor Husain Khan will be the chairman of the committee. Its members will be Yar Muhammad Solangi, Mian Basharat Shafi and Yousaf Javed Qamar. Shafqat Husain Naghmi will be the convener of the committee.
Hafiz Manzoor Husain Khan will visit India soon to settle the accounts of the World Cricket Cup which was jointly organised by the two countries.
The PCB will present a feasibility report on establishing a Cricket Academy at Lahore, and if possible also at Karachi.
The house also approved international programme of the Pakistani senior and junior teams. Pakistan under-19team will visit Britain while the Pakistan senior side will go to Kuala Lumpur to play in the Super Eight Tournament this month. Pakistan senior team will play a five-match series with the Indian side at Toronto (Canada).
Pakistan will participate in the cricket event of the 16th Commonwealth Games at Kuala Lumpur in September. It will also take part in the Super Eight Tournament in Australia in October and then in the Nine-Nation knock-out Tournament in Bangladesh the same month. Pakistan ``A'' side will visit New Zealand in November. Pakistan senior team will tour India in January, 1999. The same month Pakistan ``A'' side will also visit India.
The Australian cricket team will tour Pakistan in September and the Zimbabwe team in November.
Mohsin Hasan Khan and Dr Dan Kiesel expressed satisfaction over improvement made by 90 per cent players during camp training. They said that weaknesses spotted during camp were removed by hard training in which almost all the players fully co-operated.