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Nasir Jamshed, the Pakistan opener, has been ruled out of next month’s Sri Lanka tour after fracturing his left index finger

Umar Farooq16-May-2012Nasir Jamshed, the Pakistan opener, has been ruled out of next month’s Sri Lanka tour after fracturing his left index finger, sidelining him for four to six weeks. He had been part of the ODI and Twenty20 squads for the Sri Lanka tour. The PCB hasn’t named a replacement for Jamshed yet.He sustained the injury from a club cricket match that earlier presumed a minor injury but was later revealed to be a fracture.Jamshed, 22, had made a comeback to the Pakistan side during the Asia Cup, after an absence of nearly three years. He had a successful tournament, scoring a hundred in the crunch match against India.”He is out of action due to his finger injury,” Nadeem Sarwar, PCB GM media, told reporters on the first day of Pakistan’s training camp at the Gaddafi Stadium. “He picked up the fracture during a club match last week and wasn’t able to join the camp. His doctor has advised a four to six weeks rest and hence ruled out of the entire Sri Lanka series. There is no immediate replacement called to cover up him.”Injuries and illness have disrupted Jamshed’s career previously as well. He debuted in 2008 and was beginning to establish himself in the side when he was laid low by a fever ahead of the ODI series against West Indies in Abu Dhabi. He was later selected for the one-dayers against Australia in 2009 but after the first ODI – his first match for Pakistan in more than nine months – he suffered a hamstring injury ruling him out of the rest of the series.Edited by Siddarth Ravindran

ESPNcricinfo previews the first Twenty20 international between Sri Lanka and Pakistan in Hambantota

The Preview by Siddhartha Talya31-May-2012

Match facts

Friday, June 1, 2012

Start time 1900 (1330 GMT)Mohammad Hafeez takes charge of the Pakistan Twenty20 team•AFP

Big Picture

The Twenty20 series at the start of the tour is a good opportunity for the teams to try out players they’d have in their plans for the World Twenty20 later in the year, but just two games are unlikely to produce definitive answers. There are more elaborate preparations being made elsewhere for the competition; Bangladesh, Zimbabwe and South Africa will soon take part in an unofficial triangular Twenty20 series, Bangladesh have also asked Ireland to arrange for five Twenty20s in July, there is a Sri Lanka Premier League planned for August and several Indian and overseas regulars have already benefited from the IPL.Mohammad Hafeez, the new Pakistan Twenty20 captain, called the IPL a “missed opportunity” for his players, who’ll have to make do with these two games in Hambantota. The World Twenty20 is a few months away and the immediate aim is to gain an initial edge on a big tour which is Pakistan’s biggest assignment since beating (in Tests and ODIs) Sri Lanka and England in ‘home’ conditions in the UAE.At least seven Sri Lankan players in the current squad have had a chance to play the IPL this year, and their freshness from that experience will have prepared them well against Pakistan, who had a training camp in Lahore before this tour.

Form guide

(most recent first)
Pakistan: LLWWW
Sri Lanka: LWWWW

Players to watch

Shoaib Malik: He’s not part of Pakistan’s ODI squad for the series but if he gets a chance to play in the Twenty20s, he’ll be under scrutiny. He’s had a poor run in ODIs and mixed results in the shortest format since he came back to the national team; he’s among the seniors but another failure could cost him.Chamara Kapugedera: Sri Lanka persisted with him for a long time despite poor returns but he’s not part of their ODI squad this time. He’s been picked for the Twenty20s though, and has been in good form of late, with scores of 86 not out and 79 in his last four innings. A hard-hitting batsman down the order, Kapugedera has a chance to make a mark again for the national side, in the lead-up to the World Twenty20.

Team news

Pakistan played their last Twenty20 international in February this year and have made some changes to their squad. One of them is the inclusion of wicketkeeper-batsman Shakeel Ansar, who is expected to play. Umar Akmal had been assigned the keeping duties before this, and he could likely play as a full-time batsman. Mohammad Sami, who hasn’t played for Pakistan since November 2010, is one to keep an eye on should he be included.Pakistan (possible): 1 Mohammad Hafeez (capt), 2 Ahmed Shehzad, 3 Umar Akmal, 4 Shoaib Malik, 5 Khalid Latif/Haris Sohail, 6 Shahid Afridi, 7 Shakeel Ansar (wk), 8 Sohail Tanvir/ Hammad Azam, 9 Mohammad Sami, 10 Umar Gul, 11 Saeed Ajmal.Sri Lanka have picked left-arm seamer Isuru Udana in their squad, a bowler known to deliver a well-disguised slow bouncer. They also have legspinner Kaushal Lokuarachchi in their ranks. Both don’t feature in the ODI squad.Sri Lanka (possible): 1 Mahela Jayawardene (capt), 2 Tillakaratne Dilshan, 3 Dinesh Chandimal, 4 Kumar Sangakkara (wk), 5 Angelo Mathews, 6 Thisara Perera, 7 Chamara Kapugedera, 8 Nuwan Kulasekara, 9 Kaushal Lokuarachchi, 10 Lasith Malinga, 11 Isuru Udana.

Stats and trivia

• Hambantota will be making its debut as an international Twenty20 venue, though it’s hosted four ODIs before this. The results have been largely one-sided.
• Mahela Jayawardene is 47 short of reaching 1000 runs in Twenty20 internationals.

Quotes

“We had a pretty decent two weeks camp before we came here, finishing up with some practices that were attended by conservatively 15,000 people who were starved of cricket and they just loved them.”

“What makes them competitive is the sort of bowling options available, apart from the specialists.”

AB de Villiers struck a 58-ball half-century but was the only one of the South African batsman to show staying power

Firdose Moonda at New Road27-Jul-2012
Scorecard Albie Morkel made a half-century but players who needed runs missed out•Getty Images

Two wickets in two overs from Dale Steyn and half centuries from AB de Villiers and Albie Morkel papered over the South Africans’ unresolved issues after the first day of their tour match against Worcestershire. The three batsmen who most needed time in the middle were all out cheaply on one of their only opportunities to have match time ahead of the second Test at Headingley next week.Openers Alviro Petersen and Jacques Rudolph, the latter standing in for Graeme Smith who is back home with his new-born daughter, were dismissed in the first eight overs. JP Duminy made just 5 and Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel were dismissed cheaply. A useful contribution from Vernon Philander, who has not lived up to his allrounder status thus far, buoyed the South African lower order.After a fairly quiet start, Rudolph tried his first aggressive shot off David Lucas in the fifth over only for Neil Pinner at point to put the chance down. However, the drop was not costly as Rudolph inside-edged onto his stumps playing an expansive drive four balls later.De Villiers hit the first boundary of the match, a pull through midwicket, to set the tone for his innings but Petersen could not follow suit. The opener, who made a duck in the Test match, looked tentative and eventually succumbed when he went forward to Chris Russell, who has yet to play a first-class game, and got an edge to second slip.The innings was steadied by de Villiers, who brought out his full range of strokes, and JP Duminy, another who did not bat at The Oval. They put on a partnership of 53, although Duminy contributed minimally and it was up to de Villiers’ drives and pulls to keep the score moving. Duminy was lbw when he played back to Jones.Albie Morkel, who did not feature in the squad until an injury ruled out Marchant de Lange, made a solid start with two boundaries off Jones’ sixth over and used the opportunity to put it an extended innings. Morkel was solid after lunch, with his cover drive earning him most of his runs and put on 91 with de Villiers for the fourth wicket. He was also dismissed after missing a drive, to give Russell his third wicket.Morkel’s was the first of five wickets that fell in 72 runs. De Villiers was caught at cover playing a lazy shot and the spinners did the rest of the damage. Moeen Ali removed Steyn and Morne Morkel while Shaaiq Choudhry undid the replacement wicketkeeper Thami Tsolekile and Robin Peterson, who was caught at mid-on.South Africa declared with 22 overs left in the day and Dale Steyn steamed in to make an immediate impact. He induced the edge of Daryl Mitchell off the first ball of the innings and Alviro Petersen dived to his right to take the catch. With the first ball of his next over, Steyn removed Moeen, caught by the same fielder.Matt Pardoe and James Cameron saw off 12 and a half overs before Cameron was caught at first slip. Pardoe saw out the day to end on an unbeaten 40.

Jonny Bairstow is not the sort to buckle under the pressure according to his Yorkshire and England team-mate Tim Bresnan.

David Hopps14-Aug-2012Jonny Bairstow, who will be charged with the unenviable task of replacing Kevin Pietersen in the series-deciding Test against South Africa at Lord’s, is not the sort to buckle under the pressure according to his Yorkshire and England team-mate Tim Bresnan.Memories of an uncertain Test series against West Indies when he was unsettled by short-pitched bowling from Kemar Roach will be quite enough to cope with as he faces Dale Steyn and Co. and to replace Pietersen, whose absence has attracted such attention, will not make his task any easier.Bresnan suggested that all the fuss will wash over him. “I don’t think he’ll care who’s been dropped or who he’s replaced,” he said. “It’s a chance for him to impress everyone, a chance for him to play in a Test match and a chance for him to show exactly what he can do and show how talented he is.”Bairstow had suffered a lean run of form for Yorkshire after he was dropped from England’s Test side, but an assertive hundred against Australia A at Old Trafford will have restored his self-belief.”He is unbelievably talented and I think he can get runs at this level if he gets a start,” Bresnan said. “All he needs to do is feel a bit of confidence out there and he got that last week against Aussie A. He played really well against a really good attack. He took Mitchell Johnson apart. From what I saw on the highlights he played some unbelievable shots and played the short ball well as well.”Bresnan put Bairstow’s problems against West Indies down to uncertainty about whether his normal aggressive style should have been adopted in a Test at Trent Bridge at a time when Roach was producing a hostile spell with the second new ball in testing conditions, albeit that England were 300 for 4 when he came in to bat.”He just looked in two minds about what to do with it,” Bresnan said. “When I’ve seen him play in county cricket he tends to just smash it in the stand. If that’s his way of doing it then that’s what he needs to do at this level as well.”Maybe in his first Test he decided to do something different when he came up against the West Indies which is nothing new there. It’s just a bit of inexperience creeping in because you don’t want to get caught on the hook in your first Test match. But I think if that’s the way he plays it that’s the way he should play it this week.”Bresnan was the latest England player to be asked his view about the Pietersen rumpus and his response had something for everyone: the ECB were within their rights to take a stance against Pietersen, but he would also have no issues with him coming back into the side if the issues were resolved.”I think the ECB and the management have got to take a stance at some point and it doesn’t necessarily matter what’s going on in the calendar. If they feel the stance is now then the stance is now.”Personally I’ve got no problem with Kevin so yeah, if everyone a lot higher up the pecking order than me says it’s deemed okay for him to come back and play that’s fine by me. It’s the same welcome he’ll get as Jonny got when he joined the squad yesterday.”

Ali de Winter, Australia’s new bowling coach, says maintaining a balance on bowlers’ workload will keep them fresh in a busy international schedule

Brydon Coverdale03-Aug-2012During Australia’s one-day tour of England in June, James Pattinson spoke of the importance of Australia’s new bowling coach being a proven practitioner, a former international player who could teach the young bowlers from personal experience. There was no doubt that Pattinson, and many of his fast-bowling colleagues, enjoyed having Craig McDermott around the group over the previous year and thrived under his guidance.Less than two months later, Cricket Australia has appointed McDermott’s replacement: Ali de Winter, who was the stand-in bowling coach on that England tour. He does not have international playing experience, nor even a great deal of first-class experience – in 21 first-class matches for Tasmania he collected 35 wickets at an average of 50.51. But he is a career coach, a man who has honed his teaching skills over a decade, internationally and in Australia.He is also far from the only international bowling coach to be drawn from the first-class sphere: David Saker (England), Joe Dawes (India) and Damien Wright (New Zealand) did not reach international level and are now in charge of Test attacks. Cricket Australia had no doubts that de Winter was the right man for the job – the Pakistan champion Waqar Younis also applied – but de Winter is aware there will be plenty of people who will take convincing, just as Pattinson had done.”I read that with interest,” de Winter said of Pattinson’s comments. “But to James’ credit he came to me straight away and he wanted to talk through that. To me, that showed a sign of maturity. By the end of the four weeks we were on the same page and we were good mates, we could share information and we had started to build up that trust and he was really supportive of me going forward with the process and he’s really looking forward to working with me now.”I think there will be people who will say that the bowling coach needs to have been there and done it. I’m a career coach, so I don’t necessarily believe that. I’ve got a lot of trust and faith in the experience that I’ve had internationally and here with Cricket Tasmania. I think it will be an issue to some people. I think the pressure will come on if the bowling group don’t start to show that they’re improving. But it doesn’t matter to me. It matters to some.”Pattinson is one member of a very promising group of young Australian fast bowlers who will be working with de Winter on a full-time basis now, along with the likes of Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc. But one of de Winter’s major challenges will be to work with the team’s medical staff to keep the young attack fit, which over the past year has proven harder than expected.Pattinson, 22, picked up an abdominal strain during the England tour and has also had back and foot complaints since making his Test debut in December. Cummins, 19, was sent home from England with a side strain and also suffered a foot injury over the summer, and keeping both young men on the field will be critical to Australia’s plans over the next 12 months leading up to next year’s Ashes.”I think their actions are both pretty sound,” de Winter said. “There’s little bits of tinkering you can do along the way but they’ve got to where they are because their actions are good and they’re able to execute skill. That’s one thing we don’t have to worry about. The focus should be on having them physically fit enough and prepared as best as they can be.”That means maintenance on their strength and their fitness all the way along, as well as getting good treatment and recovery. That’s a difficult thing to balance in such a busy schedule. We need to maybe target bowlers that are better at one form of the game and have them more available for Test cricket if that’s what it is, or one-day cricket if that’s what it is, because in this climate we’re in now it’s very difficult to play all forms, all the time.”We’ve got to find a strategy to make sure that we have less injuries. With such a busy schedule in the next 12 to 18 months I think we need to jump on that pretty quickly. People have talked about rotating the bowlers through at different times and I think that’s worth consideration. But you can only rotate if you’ve got good players to come in.”The national selectors have already shown their hand in that regard by leaving Pattinson out of their Twenty20 plans, but rotation will become more of an issue with a heavy schedule over the next year including the ICC World Twenty20, home Test series against South Africa and Sri Lanka and a Test tour of India ahead of the Ashes, not to mention one-day internationals scattered throughout.De Winter hopes that keeping the bowlers strong will also help them to become more physically intimidating, which is often a key feature of the best attacks. Peter Siddle, Ryan Harris, James Pattinson and Ben Hilfenhaus can display that kind of hostility, but de Winter wants to instil that aggression in the entire bowling group.”There’s a certain amount of aggression in that group,” he said. “That’s only four [bowlers] of maybe a dozen or 15. What I would like to see is that everybody has that mindset of being aggressive and strong and have a physical presence on the ground, which at the moment is what the South Africans are doing and what the English appear to be doing.”Australia’s bowling attack is probably not the most feared in world cricket and for a long, long time we had that aura about our bowling group. I think that’s something we should want to strive to get back to. I think we can change the physical culture in our bowling group and make sure that we’re the strongest and fittest going around. With that comes confidence.”And plenty of people will gain confidence in de Winter if he can achieve that.

India, needing to win this to stay alive, posted their first Super Eights win in World Twenty20s since 2007

The Report by Sidharth Monga30-Sep-2012
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
Virat Kohli scored his eighth fifty-plus score in his last 11 international innings•Associated Press

India-Pakistan matches – never mind the tournament context – often tend to be a contest as much of nerves as of cricketing skills. Keeping in with recent times, where India have tended to come out the mentally stronger side, Pakistan’s batsmen tried too hard and imploded to waste a dream start and post the lowest total of the Super Eights stage of this World Twenty20. Virat Kohli, who had scored 183 in his previous match against Pakistan, then steered the chase of 129 with his eighth fifty-plus score in his last 11 international innings.This was a game where one of two jinxes would be broken. It was India, needing to win this to stay alive, who posted their first Super Eights win in World Twenty20s since 2007. Pakistan were still without a win over India in any World Cup match. Pakistan were every bit a team with a bogey attached to them. They tried flamboyance with the bat and failed, and didn’t show heart to back up their talented bowling and attack. India, on the other hand, did the small things well after a nervous start, and were there to accept every opportunity that Pakistan presented.Anxious more than enthusiastic, Pakistan began with 26 runs and five boundaries in the first two overs, but regressed in the coming overs. Some of their batsmen just froze, including captain Mohammad Hafeez who scored 15 off 28, and they took 6.5 overs to score the next 26. Pakistan played 53 dot balls against bowling that was steady at best. Add to that two balls they didn’t even make India bowl.It might look like a canter looking at the scorecard, but the match had got off to an edgy start. India even looked a little meek and Pakistan tried to intimidate them. Zaheer Khan brought back memories of his first over in the 2003 World Cup final, bowling three wides in his first over here. One of them, nearly a regulation take for the keeper, found its way to the boundary. The first ball Imran Nazeer faced he smoked away to the cover-point boundary. The first ball he faced from the other end, he inside-edged Irfan Pathan for four, but the bowler came back with a trademark lbw in the same over.In the second over, out came the six-or-nothing Shahid Afridi. It was a pair of Pathans opening for India against one of the more celebrated Pathan cricketers, who was full of intent. The first ball: whacked away to long-on, the fourth: thrashed through covers. Even against Zaheer, Afridi kept swinging at everything. MS Dhoni went to the surprise pick, L Balaji, in the fifth over. Balaji began with a slower bouncer that Afridi didn’t pick, and then got him caught in the deep with the regulation bouncer in the same over.If this was a pressure match, it showed the most on Pakistan captain Hafeez, playing his 100th consecutive international for Pakistan. He would have had a perfect day had he gone to a shooting range. Almost every shot he played went straight to a fielder. As the dot balls piled on, it seemed the perfect time to introduce Yuvraj Singh, whose fitness has recently been questioned.Yuvraj had set the tone for the day early when he dived full length to save four runs off the first legitimate delivery of the match. Now he teased the Pakistan batsmen with his slow tossed-up non-turners. With pressure mounting thanks to Hafeez, Nasir Jamshed was the first to fall, trying to slog-sweep Yuvraj. Dhoni showed he had recovered from his earlier slip as he caught the underside edge cleanly. Kamran Akmal, too, edged Yuvraj in his next over, Dhoni again pouching the sharp chance. Yuvraj would fill in with a direct-hit run-out from point later.Shoaib Malik continued his love of playing India, and added 47 with Umar Akmal, but that was the last bit of fight Pakistan put up. When the time came to step up, R Ashwin’s three remaining overs came in handy, and he got them both caught at deep midwicket. The pressure of the dot balls earlier was too much.All India’s pre-match moves were working. The part-timers went for a combined 3 for 37 in their six overs, which justified playing only four bowlers. Balaji returned figures of 3 for 22. For a moment in the chase, though, it seemed it wasn’t going to be all easy. Pakistan’s new spinner Raza Hasan removed Gautam Gambhir for a duck, but they ran into a Kohli-sized brick wall.Making his comeback, Virender Sehwag played a useful hand too, adding 74 for the second wicket, but it was his partner at the wicket who was the star of the show. It helped that it was Pakistan who were meek now. Attacking men were conspicuous in their absence, and when Kohli edged Afridi through the vacant slip in the ninth over, with the run rate still about a run a ball, the match had completely slipped out of Pakistan’s hands.Kohli remained calm even after Sehwag’s fall, summing up India’s calmness on the big night.

Ishant Sharma has described his time away from the national team as the worst phase of his life, but the experience had made him mentally stronger

ESPNcricinfo staff10-Oct-2012India fast bowler Ishant Sharma has described his time away from the national team as the worst phase of his life, but the experience has made him mentally stronger and hungrier to make a full-fledged comeback. Ishant, who underwent an ankle surgery earlier this year, was in the Test squad for the home series against New Zealand in August but didn’t get a game.Ishant last played for India in the Australia Tests but had to skip the IPL this year for the sake of the surgery. He began the domestic season with three wickets for Rest of India in the Irani Cup, and separate hauls of 4 for 29 in the Challenger Trophy and Duleep Trophy quarter-final.”I think I am mentally and physically much stronger now after having gone through the worst phase of my life,” Ishant said after helping North Zone to the semi-final in the Duleep Trophy against West Zone.”Nobody asked me where I was (when out of the team). In a way, it’s good that it (injury) happened to me. But my family and friends have been very supportive.”He said he had no regrets over missing the IPL for the sake of his fitness. Last year, Virender Sehwag risked playing the IPL despite an injured shoulder. He decided to get a surgery done midway through the tournament but it meant that he had to miss the West Indies tour and part of the England Tests that followed. Ishant, who missed the short tour of Sri Lanka in July, had been training in Bangalore to work himself back to fitness before the start of this season.”I gave it a lot of thought [undergoing the ankle surgery] before going ahead with it. Missing the IPL was my decision and I don’t have any complaints,” Ishant said. “The fact that I had time for myself helped. As part of my rehabilitation, I was in the NCA (National Cricket Academy) for three months, training from 10AM to 5PM. I worked on my body and gained strength. There were several long and tough sessions but I guess hard work pays off.”He said he had worked on his outswinger. “I still continue to bowl with the same kind of intensity. Bowling a lot in the nets has helped. I have also learnt to bowl the outswinger,” he said.”It was Joe Dawes (India bowling coach) who taught me the outswinger during the New Zealand series recently. Eric Simmons (Dawes’ predecessor) was also very helpful.”India’s next international assignment is the home Test series against England starting November 15. Ishant hoped that his good start to the season would help him reclaim his place in the Test line-up, which includes first-choice seamers Zaheer Khan and Umesh Yadav.

Women’s Test cricket returns in 2013 with England Women hosting Australia Women for the Ashes

ESPNcricinfo staff27-Nov-2012While Australia’s men will be trying to regain the Ashes in England next summer, Australia’s women are faced with the opposite scenario as Women’s Test cricket returns to the schedule.The one-off Ashes Test is the sole-remaining five-day fixture in the Women’s calendar. England and Australia will meet at Wormsley on August 13 – coinciding with the conclusion of the 4th Ashes Test of the men’s series.Despite England’s dominance of the women’s game in recent years, Australia have taken two notable scalps. They beat England by four runs in the final of the Women’s World T20 in Colombo and in 2011 regained the Ashes with a seven wicket win in Sydney. England will look to take back the urn they had held since 2005.The Test precedes a three-match ODI series, beginning at Lord’s on August 20 before two matches at Hove on August 23 and 25. The tour concludes with thee T20s, the first of which takes places under floodlights at Chelmsford on August 27. The final two matches of the series serve as the hors d’orderves before men’s T20s at Southampton and Durham.”We are delighted to be hosting Australia during the much-anticipated Ashes summer,” Head of England Women’s Cricket, Clare Connor said. “From recent bi-lateral series and the encounter between the two teams in the final of the World T20, England and Australia are leading the way in the women’s game with consistently high quality performances. A summer comprising all three formats of the game will be certain to provide an entertaining and hard fought few weeks.”England Women v Australia Women 2013
August 13-16, Ashes Test, Wormsley
August 20, 1st ODI, Lord’s
August 23, 2nd ODI, Hove
August 25, 3rd ODI, Hove
August 27, 1st T20, Chelmsford
August 29, 2nd T20, Southampton
August 31, 3rd T20, Durham

Kuntal Chandra, a Bangladesh first-class cricketer, has died aged 28

ESPNcricinfo staff04-Dec-2012Kuntal Chandra, a Bangladesh first-class cricketer, has died aged 28. The police had recovered his body from Turag, in the outskirts of Dhaka, on Monday, and according to police statements in local channels and newspapers, Kuntal died of strangulation.A wicketkeeper, Kuntal was part of the Bangladesh side in the 2000 Under-19 World Cup in Sri Lanka. He later played only three first-class matches, for Chittagong Division and Sylhet Division, but was a regular in Dhaka club cricket. Kuntal was to appear for Bangladesh Biman in the First Division Cricket League of Dhaka this season.His elder brother Kowshik Chandra filed a case with the Turag police at noon on Monday against a number of unnamed people. “[Kuntal Chandra] Papon was strangled to death as no stab injuries were found,” Turag police officer-in-charge ABM Ziaul Karim told .The police found the body at around 8:30am on Monday and sent it to Dhaka Medical College that evening for the post-mortem. The inquest report said the body bore severe marks of injuries and torture.The police suspect that he might have been killed while returning to his rented house in Kalachandpur. His family said they were unable to reach him on his mobile phone since he had started his journey from Dhamrai to Dhaka at about 8pm on Sunday after attending a family programme.

BCB president is hopeful that the Pakistan players will be made available for the BPL, even though it clashes with the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy

Mohammad Isam01-Jan-2013The fall-out of Bangladesh’s reluctance to tour Pakistan could be costly for the forthcoming second season of the Bangladesh Premier League (BPL), but the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) is confident that cricketers from Pakistan will be made available. Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Zaka Ashraf’s use of the word “might” in the case of the Pakistan players’ availability has eased fears of a complete pull-out.”I still believe that a large number of Pakistani players will play in the BPL,” Nazmul Hassan, the BCB president, said on Tuesday. “He [Zaka Ashraf] didn’t directly say that the players won’t play in the BPL. He said that they will have their own league at that point of time, something which might not allow their players to come to Bangladesh. All I can do is hope for their availability.”The BPL is scheduled to begin on January 18, clashing with the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, Pakistan’s domestic first-class tournament. The PCB is unlikely to let some of the top Pakistan players take part in the BPL, though more than 50 cricketers were bought by the franchises in the auction.The seven franchises will begin their training camps from the second week of January, with foreign players expected to start arriving from January 4. If the PCB is to give NOCs (No-Objection Certificate) for the BPL, the BCB would prefer them soon because a pull-out would require the governing council and Game On Sports, BPL’s event management firm, to host a closed-door auction. In that case, it would throw the tournament into chaos, a scenario that is a major concern for the owners.”We did not receive any information of the Pakistan players not attending this year’s BPL yet. Of course it’s a concern as all the franchises had plans with the Pakistani cricketers that they bought from the auction. If they (Pakistani cricketers) are not available we (the franchisees) will have to look for other options,” Shihab Chowdhury, Dhaka Gladiators’
managing director, said.Another owner, Sylhet Royals’ Nafeesa Kamal, believed that in the event of a pull-out, the franchises will not have enough players to fill those vacant spots. “Not having Pakistan
players is definitely a concern and I think we should be informed soon
about their status. If the BPL plans to hold a closed-door auction in the
event of their unavailability, we will be left with very few good options.”The overall reaction to Bangladesh’s deferment has been of relief in many
quarters as the general perception in the country has been negative about
the proposed tour. But the BCB is not ready to give up on their bilateral
relations with their Pakistan counterparts, and the man having to answer
all the questions at this stage, Hassan, has had to resort to
diplomacy. “I haven’t spoken to them [the PCB] officially regarding this
issue. We haven’t received the reply to our letter which we sent to them
four days back.”I am not blaming Pakistan, I understand their sentiment but this is not
intentional. There is no politics in it. It’s the situation that has
compelled us not to tour Pakistan at this point of time,” said Hassan.There still remains a sense of confidence among those who run the BPL
directly, but if the PCB announces a pull-out of the top players, new
players have to be recruited at short notice. The BCB would start the new year on
a bad note, off the field, if their money-spinning T20 tournament runs into problems.