Tour to go ahead, but will start eight days later

New Zealand have agreed in principle that they will tour Pakistan for their five-match one-day international series but the tour will start eight days later than planned. The players in India awaiting the decision will return home on Thursday and then fly back to Pakistan on November 29.

Issues surrounding the tour have still to be resolved but Martin Snedden, the New Zealand Cricket chief executive did not see these issues preventing the tour going ahead. Snedden also confirmed there had been no need to ask for increased security for the side because it had been of the highest level in the first place. That point had been made after a visit to Pakistan by NZC security expert Reg Dickason.

The replacement players for Craig McMillan, Lou Vincent, Scott Styris and Ian Butler are expected to be named on Thursday, or Friday at the latest. Snedden said the players concerned had all indicated their willingness to tour.

The decision to go ahead with the tour after receipt of a threat had been a comprehensive process in which a number of issues were dealt with, and the players, and their players' association, had been happy with the provisions made. Snedden said he did expect that there would be discussion between players and their partners and families now that they were returning home, but he didn't expect these would result in more player withdrawals.

Snedden added that captain Stephen Fleming had not been completely ruled out of returning with the team. His abdominal injury is to be assessed tomorrow when it would be clearer how long his recovery would be.

He also said that he was well aware of the perception that New Zealand had become something of a reluctant tourist to the sub-continent but pointed out that the team had been involved in six or seven close scrapes over the years, far more than all the other countries in the game. He added that Cricket Australia had cancelled three tours over the years, South Africa and the West Indies had cancelled two while England and Sri Lanka had each cancelled one tour.

But Snedden said he wasn't worried about the perception that other people may have of New Zealand. "My prime responsibility is the safety and security of our players. I have to think about what is best for our players and in the best interests of player security."

The South African Cricket Board had been in touch with NZC to confirm the security arrangements that had been in place for their tour.

Snedden said he fully supported the decision of the four players returning home and was aware that it took some of the players exposed to the Karachi bomb which exploded outside their hotel last year "quite awhile" to get over the incident. "I would not expect that sort of thing to go away quickly," he said.

While the Pakistan Cricket Board had intimated through the media that if New Zealand did not tour, they would cancel the reciprocal tour to New Zealand over Christmas-New Year, Snedden could not recall having receiving that advice from the PCB directly.

Both NZC and PCB had been keeping the International Cricket Council advised of their discussions, but the ICC had not been involved in the decision-making over the tour's continuation.

Snedden said NZC had been advised not to comment on any specifics related to the threat received against the Black Caps last week.