Choudhry Zaka Ashraf is the new Chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board. He succeeds Ijaz Butt whose three-year term has provided mixed results. Butt’s reign was turbulent. The attack on the Sri Lankan team and the match fixing scandal were two blots, although Butt could claim that both these events were either out of his control or had been prevalent for some time. Butt took on player power with some success. He also stopped the issuance of tickets to journalists, a courageous decision but which did earn him some flak from the media. The positive aspects of Butt’s tenure were the winning of the T20 World Cup and reaching the semi finals of the ODI World Cup. On the negative side, Pakistan has lost the right to play international cricket at home and have to go to the Gulf States or other countries to play home matches. The blame for this cannot be laid entirely at the previous regime’s door, because the same has happened to Pakistan’s Davis Cup tennis matches. We have to realise that we are living in one of the toughest neighborhoods on the planet and until and unless the security situation settles down, few countries will take the chance of touring here. Ijaz Butt deserves a passing mark for his efforts.
Zaka Ashraf has the reputation of being a good manager. That is an essential requirement for the top job. Some of the best heads of the PCB were not former cricketers but people with good managerial background. Running cricket is not rocket science, just the use of the rarest of qualities, common sense. Mr Ashraf will have to tap the available source of experienced ex cricketers who can take his ideas forward keeping in mind the cricketing angle. But more on that later. Let us devote the remainder of this essay towards making a wish list of what Pakistan cricket needs. So, Mr. Chairman, here we go:
1. You have to bring the spectators back to domestic cricket. Forty plus years ago, people used to avidly follow their city, college or club cricket teams. There was quite a good attendance and a feeling of belonging to a team. Now we have the unpalatable prospect of ZTBL playing KRL. There is no identification with any city or region, and the spectators, all expect the diehard cricket followers, could not care less, who wins or loses. You have to identify geographical areas through their demographics and offer franchises for sale. Chances are, these same organizations will buy the franchises. Or maybe a group of citizens from their area will pool their resources together. A draft of the available players’ pool should be held, like the Major League Baseball draft. Each franchise would have Division 1, 2, 3 teams and would market their team on the television and media. They would ensure that anyone coming to the ground would have an enjoyable hassle free experience. They would market their brand logo in the shape of shirts, caps and bags. The franchise would essentially be a business run for profit.
2. The stadiums should be modernised. Nowadays, the stress is mainly towards the VIP booths with the common spectator having to rough it out. Tickets and seats should be guaranteed. There should be ample and hygienic toilet facilities, something that is usually an afterthought. Good quality food should be available. In other words, going to a cricket match with one’s family should be a pleasurable experience with a guarantee of security. Only then will the public throng to the stadia to support their local teams.
3. The pitches in our stadiums are reported to be grossly overused. Their constant rolling and continuous play makes them a batting paradise. The square at the Oval cricket ground has over 24 pitches as do all the other grounds in London. Each pitch, on average, probably has two weeks of cricket on it a year. This keeps the pitches fresh and livelier and more responsive for the bowlers. One doubts if Gaddafi Stadium uses more than eight pitches all year. Their usage is probably many times higher than at the Oval. Bigger squares will make for pitches that offer encouragement to both batsman and bowler.
4. The PCB should hire knowledgeable cricketers as cricket scouts. These part time employees would attend matches in their areas and keep an eye out for talent. In our cricketing structure, there is no set system for a talented player to work his way to the top. Most of the great players have been discovered from relative obscurity. These scouts could recommend talented players to the Board and their success rate should be charted, just to make sure that they do not indulge in favouritism.
5. Rather than spend astronomic sums on hiring a “foreign” coach, the funds could be better utilised in hiring a cadre of local coaches who could develop the sport at the grass roots level. They could work with schools in their areas, through the schools’ physical education teachers and initiate mini cricket programs in the children’s physical education periods or recesses. The equipment could be plastic bats and balls that could last a long time and take a lot of punishment.
6. What the national team needs is a manager who is knowledgeable about cricket. He should be a no nonsense disciplinarian with a good reputation and managerial skills. The Test cricketer does not need much coaching. He just needs to sharpen his skills and some mentoring. In the internet age, it does not take much to send a player’s video to several experts for analysis. This is being done in other sports. What is most important is that the manager be powerful and have the respect and, yes, fear of the players.
7. The Selection Committee should be carefully selected and should be accountable for their selections and omissions. A young cricketer should be selected with great care for the national team and once selected should be persevered with. If he fails a few times and is rejected, that is a failure not of the cricketer but of the Selection Committee and they should be asked why they have taken such steps. No one should be unaccountable.
8. The gap between domestic and Test cricket should be reduced. Test cricket is an insecure job at best. When cricketers are insecure about their position on the team, they will look to make hay while the sun is shining, because the drop to the domestic level is too big.
8. Last, but not least, the Chairman should look to hiring a CEO who can augment his own management skills and put his ideas into practice. This CEO should have unimpeachable character, should be respected by the international cricketing community, should have a depth of knowledge about the sport and should have no vested interests. The number of cricketers who fulfill these requirement are very few. Some have held this position in the past and have done well under difficult circumstances. Others are jockeying for position but are falling short on some of the above criteria. In fact, one front runner is reported to have been caught match fixing a veterans’ match in India and been banned from competing!
Good luck Mr.Chairman and may you move cricket forward by taking on the achievements of the previous regime and shedding their failures. You are certainly going to need the luck!!
