Pakistan Cricket Board contemplates launching T20 event – Cricket News Update
Hoping to end a 3-year international cricket drought in Pakistan, the PCB is contemplating the staging of an international T20 tournament, and plans to hold a meeting to discuss the feasibility of organizing such an event.
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 has not hosted competitive cricket since 2009, when the visiting Sri Lankan team became the target of a terrorist attack in Lahore. Since then, the country has been deemed unsafe to serve as a venue for international tournaments.
However, the PCB chairman, Zaka Ashraf, has recently expressed an interest in bringing about a revival of cricket in the country, and the board has been considering the possibility of launching a T20 league similar to the Indian and Bangladeshi Premier leagues
in their neighbouring countries. While organizing a Pakistan Premier League T20 event has been considered before, concrete steps for executing the plan have not been taken until now.
The chairman has confirmed that the board will be holding a two-day meeting, beginning on March 23, to study the modules of the IPL and BPL in order to construct a feasible model for the proposed PPL.
“The meeting will be carried with the main purpose of studying the two successful leagues and propose our own realistic model,” http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Ashraf-c46397 said. “This would include the decision on the number of teams and international players allowed per side, keeping in mind
that not many stars can travel here.”
“Players and officials who’ve been part of the Indian Premier League and the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Bangladesh-c747 Premier League could be called upon for their input later,” he added.
Ashraf’s announcement comes in the wake of Pakistan’s recent attempt to host Bangladesh for a series in April this year, a proposition which the Bangladeshi board had previously agreed to. A delegation from Bangladesh traveled to Pakistan to assess the situation,
and claimed they were satisfied with the security arrangements.
However, after the ICC claimed that while the series would get official endorsement, they refused to provide match officials, citing security concerns. Consequently, the BCB has begun to express doubts about the series, claiming that they will not send their
team “if proper rules are not followed including allocation of match-referees and umpires by the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/ICC-World-Cup-2011-c100625.”
Ashraf however, maintained an optimistic tone, and insisted the whole thing was a misunderstanding. He claimed he had spoken to the BCB President http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mustafa-Kamal-c78122, and explained that the any match officials used would be ICC-approved.
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