PCB bosses meet departmental heads

KARACHI: The PCB chairman Ehsan Mani and MD Wasim Khan met heads of sports of a few organisations which have their cricket teams in order to discuss how they could financially support domestic cricket, ‘The News’ learnt on Tuesday.

Informed sources said that last week the PCB high officials visited Karachi during the ODI series against Sri Lanaka and met with heads of sports of a few banks and other institutions.

The PTI-led federal government had directed those departments which come under its purview to meet the PCB officials and find ways to strengthen the new format of domestic cricket.

The sources said that letters had been sent to NBP, SNGPL, PIA, SSGC, WAPDA, CAA, SBP, and PIA. Mani and Wasim met NBP president Arif Usmani and some other NBP high officials and their sports department officials.

The NBP has been operating teams of cricket, hockey, and football. It owns a sports complex in Clifton area of Karachi.

The sources said that a former Test cricketer associated with PCB for a long period gave a presentation to the NBP president. He invited NBP to bear expenditure of any cricket team or invest in domestic cricket at grassroots level.

Former Test cricketer Iqbal Qasim, who heads NBP’s sports department, was also present on the occasion. It is pertinent to mention here that Iqbal has worked for PCB in different positions.

The sources said that the PCB officials assured the institutions that their interests would be protected if they invested money in domestic cricket. The NBP high officials welcomed the move but said that they would put up the PCB’s proposal in front of NBP’s committees to examine its viability.

The PCB bosses also called on SBP’s high officials during the visit and made the same offer to them. The central bank also owns a sports complex with a cricket stadium and runs its own cricket team.

The sources said that most of the heads of the institutions showed little interest in the presentations of PCB. They showed little inclination to bear the expenditure of domestic cricket at grassroots level after their teams had been ousted from the domestic cricket.