LAHORE: Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Zaka Ashraf has played down the statement of Ijaz Butt.

PCB’s former chairman Ijaz Butt had told Dawn that IPL chairman Rajiv Shukla assured him that Pakistani players would be invited to participate in the next edition of the tournament.

“Ijaz Butt can give better reply of the question and decisions on every issue will be made through dialogue between the two boards,” Zaka told reporters at the airport while leaving for India to watch the final of the IPL.

He said the PCB has made substantial increase of 25 per cent in the players’ central contract, besides enhancing 10 per cent in their match fees.

To a question that several cricketers of the national team got angry during PCB’s reception in honour of the Asia Cup-winning side on Friday night after some artists passed sarcastic remarks regarding their performance, Zaka said the artists should be respectful to cricketers since they are our heroes.

But he also advised cricketers to show sportsmanship.

It is pertinent to mention that Misbah-ul-Haq, Shahid Afridi and Umar Akmal left half way through the function in protest after being ridiculed by the comedians.

Sources said that cricketers were unhappy, saying that the reception was held to boost their morale ahead of Sri Lanka tour, but there was no such thing and in fact they were demoralised during the function.

“We were sitting in the function after winning the Asia Cup but the way some artists taunted us it seemed as if the cricketers did something wrong,” one of the cricketers told Dawn.

The same cricketer also expressed his disappointment over PCB’s failure to honour the national team which whitewashed England in the Test series despite playing as underdogs.

“We won Asia Cup after 12 years, but beating world No 1 side England 3-0 in Test series was also a feat which we achieved for the first time in our history,” he said.