PCB shuns own greats, hires Lloyd to coach Juniors

The Pakistan Cricket Board Monday hired former West Indies captain Clive Lloyd to coach the junior team on an eight-day assignment while contradicting its claims of being cashstrapped and in the meantime ignoring own greats.

Lloyd will pass on valuable tips to the World Cup-bound Pakistan squad between Jan 2 and 10 at Rawalpindi. The tournament begins in New Zealand from Jan 15.

Lloyd is the second foreigner to have been awarded a brief but presumably a lucrative junior coaching assignment. Earlier this year, Englishman Geoffrey Boycott spent 15 days at Lahore and returned with bagful of money without delivering anything of note.

The PCB revealed no details of the financial package awarded to Lloyd saying it was a confidential matter between the two parties.

A PCB spokesman also played down Lloyd's appointment saying it shouldn't be taken as a guarantee that the team would win the tournament in New Zealand. "It (foreign appointment) is not always related to winning.

"He is a world renowned player and has been appointed after he expressed his availability," the spokesman said. However, the spokesman failed to explain the justification of hiring Lloyd in the background that the team coach (Haroon Rasheed) is himself a former Test batsman, Zaheer Abbas is the chairman of junior selection committee, and former captain Javed Miandad is being linked with future junior academy projects.

Miandad would have been the ideal choice if the real objective was to increase the knowledge of the junior players. Besides being a role model for the local youngsters, Miandad was the Pakistan team coach that toured New Zealand earlier this year on a 40-day tour.

But the PCB is notoriously known for throwing valuable funds on hiring foreigners instead of making better use of the limited resources. The only area in which the PCB has justifiably invested is the infrastructure and ground facilities.

Interestingly, the PCB has been rejecting International Cricket Council's offer to utilize the services of Michael Holding to improve the bowling action of Shoaib Akhtar, arguing that it had limited funds following losses estimated to be worth $30million following cancellation of series' this year.

Nevertheless, the plus point in the exercise is that a high profile West Indian will be visiting Pakistan particularly in the background that Caribbean are scheduled to tour Pakistan in February and March next year.

So sure Lloyd's visit will brush aside any suspicion anyone has on the tour, chiefly after political uncertainty in Afghanistan. Needless to say that Pakistan Under-19's series against Sri Lanka Under-19 was played without any hassles or concerns.