PCB’s mismanagement has resulted in NZ chaos: Zaka Ashraf

LAHORE: The present Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) setup has been blasted by former chairman Zaka Ashraf for its gross mismanagement, resulting in the messy and troublesome situation with the Pakistan team in New Zealand after too many of its players tested positive for Covid-19 there.

The PCB has the position that players could have contracted the virus during their trip from Lahore to Auckland as they were cleared before departure in the local testing process.

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“If correct, then the PCB should have been more cautious in deciding the team’s travel plan,” Zaka said in a statement.

Instead of sending the contingent to Auckland on direct flights from Dubai or Abu Dhabi, the PCB chose a route where the squad waited for hours at various airports before reaching New Zealand, Zaka said. A chartered flight may have been another good option to keep the team from flying in an unintended scenario. “I don’t think a chartered flight would have been too costly for the PCB, which is paying its officials millions of rupees,” Zaka said.

Because of their unprofessional and reckless way of functioning, are these well paying PCB officials there to generate such humiliation for the Pakistani players? “Asked him. For hosts New Zealand, the situation may not inflict any humiliation, but for Pakistan and PCB for their gross mismanagement,” he added.”

It can be mentioned here that when Pakistan toured England last summer, the England and Wales Cricket Board hired chartered flights for the Pakistan team and displayed integrity and better leadership to host three teams one after another, without any controversy or confusion, namely Pakistan, West Indies and Ireland.

Zaka said it was not the first time that the management of this cricket board has made such an error and is now actively seeking damage control that revealed their unprofessionalism.

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He said that after opener Fakhar Zaman was removed from the squad due to fever at the eleventh hour of the start, all the players and officials should have been screened again. While the PCB argues that because of fever, Fakhar Zaman was separated from the group, a new Covid-19 test of the whole squad could have been completed, even at the expense of delaying the team’s departure to Auckland,” he contended.”