The selection of junior teams- a dilemma

The selection of young players for the teams of different age groups for foreign tours or even for participation in national tournaments has always been problematic The urge for selection in a representative side being so great that the boys resort to tampering with their age without realizing the consequences. I remember, way back in 1978-79 when the Pakistan Cricket Board was in the process of selecting the Pakistan Under-19 team for a tour of India and Sri Lanka, we had to shunt out two very promising boys for tampering with their Secondary School certificates. Although they did not play for Pakistan, both of them later distinguished themselves in League cricket in England where there was no age barrier.

With the ever rising number of competitions for young players of different age groups, the practice of tampering with the age also increased in quantum. The Selection Committees appointed at different levels relied on the figures mentioned in birth certificates issued by the Municipal Corporations, the hospitals where the births had taken place and the certificates issued by the educational institutions. The rising tendency of forging documents on the part of young aspirants compelled the cricket officials to verify the doubtful birth certificates, many of which came out to be forged or mutilated. It may be interesting to know that as a common practice, many parents register the age of their children reduced by 6-12 months at the time of admitting them in the school. For the purpose of selection in a team, the forging of age does not only constitute the violation of rules but also acts as an infringement of the genuine rights and claims of other eligible players.

To eliminate the chances of age fraud in junior cricket, The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) started conducting wrist test of the players, first introduced by the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Trust (SKMT) Hospital established by Imran Khan but later spread to major hospitals all over the country. These tests were for the first time conducted on the boys who formed the Pakistan team that participated in the Under-15 World Cup held in England recently. The experiment considered to be successful was carried forward to the selection of all teams participating in the national Under-19 tournaments. The underlying idea being that, the selection of genuine Under-19 teams at associations' level will automatically ease the job of the PCB while selecting the national Under-19 team.

According to the Pakistan's Domestic Cricket rules, the boys failing the wrist test are sacked for playing any type of cricket in the country for one year, full winning points are awarded to the opposing team while action is also taken against the officials of the association concerned. To ensure strict implementation of the rules and to eliminate the practice of overage players finding their way in junior cricket, the PCB is sending its representatives to various match centers in the country to monitor the situation. The latest position, however, is that after finding that at times wrist test alone is not sufficient to determine the correct age of players, the PCB has now decided to send the suspected over-age players for both wrist and ankle tests. It is learnt that the ankle tests have proved quite successful in determining the age of players. One must appreciate the steps taken by the PCB and hope the evil practice will end sooner or later.

The dilemma of fake clubs

Like the shameful practice of forging birth certificates discussed above, the existence of scores of fake clubs in the country also caused tremendous damage to the game in particular and the legitimate clubs in general. In the real earnest the genuine country-wide elections of clubs were only held in 1978-79 when the regional associations were re-established and affiliated to the Board after having been suspended for some time. After that golden era of cricket, the associations took control of things, conducting their own elections, true or false, whenever they liked and informed the Cricket Board accordingly. The lack of proper control and monitoring gave rise to a mushroom of clubs, which did not fulfill the criteria laid down for their functioning. The other category was the fake clubs, the ones that did not exist on the ground. It is said that the self elected officials of these clubs issued fake press releases to gain personal publicity, even played week end matches on the table and issued meticulously drafted fake score cards to the press.

About 4 years back when a renowned test cricketer was Chief Executive of the Board, the scrutiny of clubs was carried out but its proceedings dumped somewhere for unknown reasons. Although the findings were not announced, they leaked out somehow. Some clubs that existed for more than 20 years were not granted the right of vote while many of them who did not qualify were favored with the rights. Protests from scores of genuine clubs who had been victimized prevented the PCB to announce the results of the scrutiny. The anxiety and uncertainty thus continued to prevail in the cricket circles.

The PCB Adhoc Committee which presently holds the reins of cricket in the country, however, took the initiative of conducting a new scrutiny. Since the whole exercise was carried out by a committee comprising of non-technocrats who knew little about the structure of cricket in the country and the history of clubs, the cricket circles are not happy about the results announced by them. According to a news item, "The Board followed the policy of nepotism and favoritism during the scrutiny and disqualified genuine clubs and entertained the fake ones". The report listed a number of clubs that had existed for more than two decades and won a number of local tournaments besides producing lot of players for junior as well as senior teams but were not granted the right of vote. The report also mentioned about two dozen local clubs which were not involved in cricketing activities at any level but recognized as genuine.

The genuine clubs deprived of the right of vote have requested the Board to reconsider the findings of the Scrutiny Committee, failing which they have threatened to adopt the legal recourse.

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