KARACHI: After an action-packed National T20 Cup in Multan and Rawalpindi, the focus shifts to Karachi as Pakistan’s largest city gears up to host the first-class Quaid-e-Azam Trophy from 25 October.
The first three rounds will be played across three venues – National Stadium, NBP Sports Complex and UBL Sports Complex – before the tournament takes an 11-day break during which the play-offs of the HBL Pakistan Super League 2020, which had to be postponed due to an outbreak of Covid-19 in the country, will be staged. Besides the three venues, State Bank Stadium will also host six matches of the 31-match tournament.
The six team captains were taken to a photo-shoot with the prestigious tournament trophy at the Quaid-e-Azam Mausoleum (Mazar-e-Quaid) on Friday. The players travelled in a sterilised bus and maintained social distancing at the location while fully following the existing Covid-19 SOPs and protocols during the shoot.
With the Pakistan’s men’s national team and Pakistan Shaheens scheduled to travel to New Zealand on 23 November, the first three rounds serve as an audition for the first-class cricketers to stake a claim in the red-ball side on the back of impressive performances.
In line with the PCB’s vision of incentivising top-performers, more than PKR17million are up for grabs over the course of the 31-match tournament with the winning prize money PKR10million and the runner-up bagging PKR5million.
The top-performers – player of the tournament, best batsman, best bowler and best wicketkeeper – will pocket PKR500,000 each. The player of the final will be awarded PKR50,000.
Defending champions Central Punjab will begin their campaign from the National Stadium as they take on hosts Sindh in a match which will be televised live on PTV Sports and relayed all over the world by the Pakistan Cricket Board’s official YouTube channel.
With Babar Azam leading Pakistan in the three ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup Super League matches and as many T20Is, Azhar Ali will take charge of the defending champions Central Punjab side, which includes seasoned wicketkeeper-batsman Kamran Akmal, who finished as the second highest run-getter in the last edition of the first-class Quaid-e-Azam Trophy with 906 runs at 60.40.
Azhar will also have services of Test off-spinner Bilal Asif, who with 43 wickets from nine matches finished as the second highest wicket-taker in the 2019-20 edition. The side is further strengthened by the returns of Ahmed Shehzad, who captained Central Punjab last year with Babar on national duty, and pacer Hasan Ali.
After Salman Butt withdrew himself from the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, Ali Zaryab has been promoted to Central Punjab’s first XI team.
Central Punjab captain Azhar Ali: “As defending champions we aim to play with attacking mindset and strategy as it won us the trophy last year. We have some exciting youngsters and have retained the core of the side and I am really looking forward to the tournament.
“With only six teams in the fray, the competition is going to be stiff and that augurs well for the tournament as the standard will be of the highest quality with all the teams capable of winning the event.”
Sarfaraz Ahmed, the former Pakistan Test captain, will be eager to ensure that his team lives up to its potential as they were one of the two teams, other being Balochistan, who failed to register a win last season. They will be banking on Fawad Alam, who was Sindh’s best batsman last year with 781 runs (four centuries and two half-centuries) to provide stability to their batting order which also boasts Test batsman Asad Shafiq and impressive youngsters like Saud Shakeel and Omair Bin Yousaf.
Tabish Khan will spearhead Sindh’s bowling attack in which Mohammad Asghar will lead the spin department.
The left-arm orthodox had the fourth most wickets with 27 scalps in eight matches for Balochistan last year. Tabish took 25 wickets in the previous season, his new-ball partner Sohail Khan is not available for the opening clash due to a throat infection but is expected to join the team in the later rounds.
Sindh captain Sarfaraz Ahmed: “Last year we were not able to win any matches despite coming close and dominating the matches most of the days. This year we have once again fielded an experienced squad with some exciting youngsters.
“Our aim would be to push for wins and keep ourselves in the contention of a final spot. I think we should have an exciting event which should keep the fans and followers engaged.”