Aqib left out of touring party

Coach Aaqib Javed and Assistant Manager Shahid Aslam dropped from management team for Zimbabwe tour.

KARACHI:

Following Intikhab Alam’s removal as team manager, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) announced the team management for the tour of Zimbabwe sans assistant coach Aqib Javed, a go-to guy for the younger members of the squad.

While Alam was replaced by governing board member Naveed Akram Cheema, Waqar Younis was named as the sole coach of a squad that comprises young inductees, including inexperienced fast-bowlers. Aqib, according to the PCB, will be staying back to perform his duties at the National Cricket Academy in Lahore.

“Aqib’s omission is not a huge thing,” a PCB spokesperson told The Express Tribune. “He’s not employed by the PCB and his services are needed more at the NCA. The management is announced on a tour-by-tour basis and this time Aqib isn’t part of it.”

Meanwhile, the PCB Chairman Ijaz Butt lauded Alam for a ‘commendable job’ following his replacement as team manager, adding that ‘his experience is always a great help and being the director game development, he is needed in Pakistan to execute these plans’.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 5^th, 2011.