By Tasawwar Abbas
LAHORE (TheSportsNext) August 14, 2012: The
Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) has told the Sialkot Stallions, Pakistan’s
domestic Twenty20 champions, to keep their original set of players for this
year’s Champions League Twenty20 Tournament to be played in South Africa.
Led by Shoaib Malik, the Sialkot Stallions would become
first Pakistani domestic T20 team to feature in the Champions League where it
will have to play a qualifying tournament to play the main round of the event
to be staged in October, 2012.
Shoaib Malik has made a strong reputation as captain of the
Sialkot Stallions taking them to domestic Twenty20 glory on more than five occasions.
The Sialkot Stallions used to have services of key Pakistani cricketers like
Imran Nazir, Rana Navid-ul-Hasan, Shoaib Malik, Shakeel Ansar, Abdul Rehman,
Reza Hasan, Qaiser Abbas, and Mohammad Asif etc. However, Mohammad Asif can no
longer play international or local cricket of any sort due to an ICC ban for
his involvement in the spot-fixing scandal.
A source in the Pakistan Cricket Board told Indian media on
Tuesday that no participating team in the Champions League can include any
guest player or make any changes to their squads and they have to go with the original
line-up which won them their domestic titles.
Despite of losing Mohammad Asif, the officials of Sialkot
cricket association are of the firm belief that they have great players in the
team who can seriously challenge any opposition in the world.
"We are not worried because we have some exciting
youngsters like Reza Hasan, Haris Sohail, Ali Khan and Bilawal Bhatti tempered
with the experienced players”, the official added.
The official further stated that they were looking to rope
in a sponsor for the Sialkot Stallions to make them arrive in South Africa
prior to the tournament so that most of the youngsters, who have never played
in bouncy and pacey South African pitches, could get acclimatized to the
cricket conditions.
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