KINGSTON, March 15: Pakistan’s impressive victory against the formidable South Africans in Cup warm-up game last week which raised the hopes of a revival of sorts in team camp, have been thwarted by the ungainly presence of PCB chief Nasim Ashraf here.

According to sources close to the team in Jamaica, things had begun to gradually fall in place last week with skipper Inzamam-ul-Haq and coach Woolmer both looking confident about their team’s chances in the mega event.

Even on the day of the opening ceremony, things looked quite hunky dory and the players appeared composed and quietly confident of staging a comeback after a largely forgettable South African safari.

But with the unforeseen arrival of the over enthusiastic board chairman at the Montego Bay bash, Pakistan has clearly lost track. The pressure is suddenly telling on the players since Dr Ashraf insists on storming the team's dressing room besides forcing his way into the the team meetings.

The worst hit by this changing scenario is none other than captain Inzamam who has not had things going to plan because of uncalled for interference of the PCB chief who has a knack of throwing ‘overbearing’ suggestions at wrong times.

Pakistan seemed to have some sane planning when they successfully chased the 200-run target against South Africa in the warm-up match last week. From 31 in 17 overs, with just one wicket down, Pakistan managed to beat the Proteas by seven wickets. But all that planning seems to be going haywire now and there is clearly some panic setting in among the team players and the team management.

Al this has made the rather innocuous game against Ireland seeming like a challenge with thoughts of asking Kamran Akmal opening the innings instead of Imran Nazir and dropping Younis Khan down the order coming from the big chief himself.

On March 12, Pakistan team was made a laughing stock in the world media after they announced that all the players will address the press conferences in Urdu and not in English. It was like a step backward as not only Inzamam but some of the other players also expressed their reservations at media manager P.J.Mir’s absurd announcement. On Tuesday when the ICC came down hard on him, Mir realized the severity of the matter and started saying that he was misquoted.

The real story was that the ICC had in principle agreed with the Pakistan Cricket Board that all the post match celebrations held at the ground will be in English as it is broadcast around the globe and anything in the media center will be in Urdu.

While other teams are allowing two to three players to the media every day, to give them the best of exposures in terms of speaking and get some exposure, Pakistan has placed an unnecessary restriction on their players.

Amid all this chaos, the last thing Pakistan can afford is to lose to minnows Ireland in this World Cup but with Dr Ashraf shooting from his mouth, just anything can happen.