Poor infrastructure responsible for World Cup debacle: Ex-Pak cricketers

Former Test players of Pakistan have blamed the poor cricket infrastructure in the country for the national team's early exit from the 2007 World Cup being played in the Caribbean Islands.

Calling for a revitalisation of the sport that has a huge fan following in the subcontinent, the former players said there was an immediate need for reviving the Constitution and strengthening local cricket associations.Former captain Intikhab Alam, opening bat Mudassar Nazar and fast bowlers Aaqib Javed and Sarfraz Nawaz told The Nation and its urdu edition Nawa-i-Waqt that almost everything was wrong with cricket in Pakistan.

Intikhab blamed Captain Inzamam-ul-Haq for the World Cup loss, and termed the selection committee as a dummy entity.

He claimed that the chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), the selectors and captain had resigned due to public pressure."First the chief patron (President Pervez Musharraf) should bring in a chairman who should be wearing one hat. It's a full time job and needs complete concentration and time. The Constitution should be made effective and the associations be made operative and strengthened with financial support," Alam said."A monitoring cell should be formed to keep an eye on the working of the associations. And accountability should be held in case of wrong doings," he added.He further said that all the bogus clubs should be closed and a selection committee be appointed that included cricketers having a life time experience of the game, and not those with a couple of Test matches experience."The committee should be working full time, travel across the country, hunt talent and watch matches. Besides, the chairman should be not be wearing two hats," he said.Mudassar and Aaqib said there should be one system and continuity. The aim should be to work for the betterment of the sport, they added.

Sarfraz criticised the authorities for doing nothing on the match-fixing issue and demanded a probe by a British inquiry committee into the Bob Woolmer's death case.

Coming to the dismal performance of the team in the World Cup, Intikhab said there was aneed to get the basics right.On Woolmer's death, he said it was too early to say anything related to match fixing and even the publisher of his book had said that there was nothing pinching in the book.

Mudassar said that poor infrastructure in domestic cricket is one of the main cause of decline in Pakistan cricket.

"The number of grounds has reduced. The wickets even at the PCB supervised grounds have green tops all the year, but who gets the green erased on match day? Then Agha Zahid is blamed for shaved wickets? We need to end the dead wickets culture," he said.

Mudassar said that rumours in Woolmer's case are coming from the Indian media.

"Australia and South Africa are the two top teams because they have tough competition in their domestic set-up and we have been compromising. It's time to take tough decisions and have quality instead of quantity, said Aaqib.

Sarfraz blamed the former cricketers of misguiding everyone on cricket, match-fixing and death of coach.

On the home front, he said that the president should not take any decision regarding the PCB in haste. (ANI)

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