The Indian Cricket League is the talk of the town these days and everyone is trying to figure out the mystery behind it. In Pakistan the cricket setup plunged into a crisis yet again after the events followed the announcement of the ICL league as few big guns decided to join the league and the PCB made matter worse by threatening the players that they would not be allowed to play for Pakistan again. The hostile statements did not help rather made a mess of the situation.

The question is that why a person should not join a league when a lucrative offer is made to him? Everyone has a right to earn a better living for himself and his family, after all people go abroad for work and come back when needed by their families, therefore the PCB should not cast doubts on the patriotism of those players who are willing to join the ICL. We read a flurry of statements from Naseem Ashraf, Shafqat Naghmi and Zakir Khan that players should give national duty a priority.

Let me remind the board officials that so many Pakistani players have played and are playing county cricket in England and some of them in the past have skipped the national duty because of their county assignments. Did the PCB take any action against them to date? No is the answer, then why this issue is being raised with this intensity now? Another statement from Zakir Khan caught my attention when he said "We believe Pakistan have a solid bench strength and if some [national] players want to sign up for ICL then they can do it. We believe that nobody is indispensable". Don’t you find this statement extremely unrealistic? We lost the recent world cup because people like Shoaib Akhtar, Muhammad Asif, Abdul Razzaq and Shahid Afridi did not play the first two matches for one reason or the other. The gap created by these players which led to Pakistan’s defeat should be filled then with the “solid bench strength” when Pakistan team was in need, but it was not done because we simply did not have the backup to replace these players.

If the ICL is not allowing anyone on his payroll to play for his country then strict action should be taken against a player for ignoring the national duty, but the ICL is not barring any player to play for his national side when required. I personally spoke to the president of the ICL’s Executive Board, Kapil Dev who made it absolutely clear that the league would release a player to perform his national duty therefore for the sake of cricket in Pakistan the PCB should think over its stance and take into consideration the reservations of the players, otherwise it will dent the Pakistan Cricket more than anything else. This matter should have been tackled in a manner that Pakistan cricket setup would remain intact.

Now coming to the issue of the team selection for the 20Twenty world cup which is scheduled to the held in South Africa next month for which people like Muhammad Yousuf and Abdul Razzaq were snubbed and they reportedly showed annoyance over it and tilted towards the ICL. Muhammad Yousuf no doubt is a world class individual but considering his age he should not prefer this fast-paced cricket and concentrate more on test and ODI cricket, having said that, if the selector were to overlook Yousuf then he should have been called for the training camps for the 20Twenty probable. As far as Razzaq is concerned, the point of view of the chief selector, Salahuddin Sallu seems correct that Razzaq was not considered on the basis of his recent performance in the ODIs. In the last 15 ODIs in which Razzaq appeared he scored only 173 runs at an average of 10.73 and he claimed 12 wickets at 39 runs each. The record shows that Razzaq was obviously off colour therefore he should not have taken a hasty decision of calling it a day, because missing the 20Twenty cup squad was definitely not the end of the road for him. Now turning to opener Imran Farhat, who in his last 15 ODIs scored only 337 runs at an average of 24.07, therefore he should not be dejected at all and concentrate on his game rather than getting involved in undue debate.

Time an again these kind of issues do disappoint cricket followers in Pakistan. To shun this practice the board should consult with players on a regular basis to listen to their reservations. The players should also handle their affairs in a professional manner and before going to the press try and resolve issues internally.

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