South African board to consider revised tour schedule

The South African board has announced it will meet in Johannesburg tomorrow to discuss reviving the cancelled tour to Pakistan. Gerald Majola, the chief executive, said he had received a letter from Pakistan offering alternative fixtures.

A statement read: "Gerald Majola is to convene a meeting of the management committee of Cricket South Africa in Johannesburg on Tuesday to discuss the PCB proposal and to receive a full briefing from security consultants."

The South Africans originally called off the tour after a bomb blast in an empty Karachi office building on Friday night. They said the security in Pakistan had deteriorated to an unacceptable level, and offered to either play the series outside Pakistan or delay the tour until security improved. The Pakistan board, however, refused to play the series away from home.

The revised fixtures miss out Karachi all together and have the option of excluding Peshawar. The South African committee will consult with their government, Eric Simons, the coach, and Graeme Smith, the captain, before making a final decision.

"We made a decision on Saturday, based on information from our security consultants who had also been in contact with intelligence agencies," Majola added. "That information was that the situation in Pakistan, particularly following a bomb blast in Karachi on Friday evening, meant that sending our team to Karachi on Sunday as planned would have constituted an unacceptable risk."

Majola said the his board would continue to assess the security situation and continue to look at it in relation to the proposed alternative fixtures: "We will continue to make every effort to find alternatives that do not pose an unacceptable level of risk to our national team."

Meanwhile, Rameez Raja, chief executive of the Pakistan board, said he was confident that the tour would still go ahead. "I talked to Gerald Majola and he has conveyed to me that they would find a positive way before Tuesday evening to reschedule the tour."

He added: "I am confident that the tour will go ahead with three Tests and as many one-day games as originally planned. They had misconceptions about Fridays blast that it was a car bomb and after talking to our security officials, they got the clear picture that the blast was not linked to terrorism."