Wednesday, October 3, 2001 Domestic cricket is still going on in Pakistan, although everybody's mind is elsewhere, and one of the regular criticisms has been that our cricket structure is second-rate. It has been suggested that we should play regional cricket and this is one of the options that the Pakistan Cricket Board is exploring. I don't agree.

For a start we would only have four regional teams: Balochistan, Punjab, NorthWest Frontier Province, and Sind. That does not give you a big enough pool to choose from because you have barely 50 first-class cricketers, and older players clog up the system.

Our regions are also fiercely independent, as you will have noticed in the reaction to the expected war. Up to the mid-1970s we did have a regional domestic structure but this tended to reinforce ethnic divisions which would then be carried over into the national team. Regional cricket in Pakistan is a powder-keg, but that is one complication that our modern Test players do not have to worry about. Departmental cricket ended that problem by mixing up Punjabis, Sindis and others.

It was AH Kardar, one of Pakistan's former captains, who introduced the departmental system and the main reason was to make sure that players could earn a decent living and have some security once they retired. Our first-class game is poor (financially), and when it was played on a regional basis players' incomes were not regular. The banks and corporations give cricketers a job and some sort of financial protection. We don't have state benefits in Pakistan, even if you are out of work. Without support from the department that they played for, many former cricketers would have a pitiful life.

A further argument put forward against departmental cricket is that the public isn't interested. But they certainly used to be. There has also been a major drift away from going to the ground to watch a game, other than for one-day internationals. Even Test matches are poorly attended. The PCB's solution is for our Test stars and overseas cricketers to play in a regional competition. I do not believe that will have much effect unless watching cricket becomes more of a family experience - like watching baseball is in North America. We should do everything we can to get the crowds back, and what is true for Pakistan is also a warning for the rest of Asia.

Javed Miandad, Pakistan's highest-scoring batsman and latterly their coach, was talking to Kamran Abbasi.

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