LAHORE: With just ten days left in the commencement of the Champions Cup, the premier one-day tournament of Pakistan’s 2024-25 domestic cricket season, a number of crucial decisions regarding the newly-introduced event are yet to be taken.

Several key decisions, including selection of the teams, schedule of matches, appointment of coaching staff, mentors and match officials, of the Sept 1-29 tournament which was introduced for the first time earlier this month, are yet to be made.

Though the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) has declared the five-team Champions Cup as its premium domestic contest, the inordinate delay in the announcement of a number of key decisions on the said event is raising several questions over the management of the Mohsin Naqvi-led PCB regime.

The PCB has planned to appoint mentors of the five teams and 10-member coaching staff for each side. The date of the application for hiring mentors is Aug 22 which plainly signifies that time is running short for completing this task.

Moreover, the matches schedule, appointment of umpires, referees and scorers and the selection of teams are other important responsibilities which are yet to be fulfilled.

Furthermore, who will select the teams for the Champions Cup based on last season’s performance of the players, remains unclear.

The Champions Cup, it seemed a few weeks ago, held great importance for the PCB, when Mohsin along with his adviser on cricket affairs Waqar Younis addressed a press conference while announcing the introduction of the event in Lahore.

In that presser, Mohsin kept urging the reporters to restrict their questions to the Champions Cup, calling it an important competition. Additionally, a central contract with the 150 players, selected for the Champions Cup, is yet to be signed.

According to an announcement made by the PCB, a centrally-contracted player of category ‘A’ for the Champions Cup will receive Rs550,000 while each category ‘B’ cricketer will be given Rs400,000.

Sources told Dawn that the PCB was also holding back the announcement of umpires for the domestic season, perhaps also because some umpires were due to be promoted from the development to the supplementary category, and from the supplementary to the elite panel.

According to sources, looking at the current circumstances the Champions Cup will be delayed.

There are also reports that a significant increase in the central contract’s salary of the umpires of the elite and supplementary panels is in the offing while a new central contract for umpires is also due.

There is good news for 15 top scorers of the domestic set-up as the PCB for the first time has issued them a contract worth Rs50,000 monthly salary.

Published in Dawn, August 21st, 2024