LAHORE: Former Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Khalid Mahmood said on Wednesday he was “alarmed and disappointed” over the declining standard of cricket in Lahore after none of its teams could reach the Super-Three round of the Inter-city Senior Cricket Championship.

Lahore fielded six teams among the 19 affiliated with the Central Punjab Cricket Association but none of them could make it to the final round with teams from Sialkot, Faisalabad and Sheikhupura qualifying.

“Lahore was the first hub of cricket, even before the partition of the sub-continent, and this performance is alarming,” Khalid said, informing that with teams being picked by selectors appointed by PCB, most talented players missed out.

The PCB organised the tournament in almost 93 cities, at the cost of millions of rupees, but there is no information regarding the results on the board’s website.

Khalid said neither the PCB nor the Punjab government was giving importance to club cricket. “No one should think that our club cricket will get sponsors like those in Australia or England and it is the job of the PCB and the governments to provide facilities in the shape of grounds and gear,” he said.

“When I was secretary of the PCB [then BCCP] with Abdul Hafeez Kardar as president, the great Kardar always gave much importance to the club cricket, providing them free equipments and appointed people to notify him of any talented cricketer.”

Khalid informed that instead of providing more cricket grounds, the Punjab government had considered an option to turn the Lahore City Cricket Association ground into a hotel to provide accommodation to foreign teams.

“Even to think about turning the LCCA ground into a hotel is a criminal act for me as in fact, the city is already lacking in proper grounds,” he said.

He lamented the fact that the current PCB setup was completely focused at Twenty20 cricket and that was leading to the decline in other formats.

Published in Dawn, August 12th, 2021