Twenty-two teams to compete in national one-day contest

Lahore, Sept 15: Twenty-two teams from all over the country will take part in the National One-Day Cricket Championship to be held at 12 venues from Sept 20 to Oct 10.

A press conference about the championship was jointly addressed by Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) Domestic Tournament Monitoring Committee (DTMC) chairman Javed Zaman Khan and Rumman Ahmad, representative of Tissot Company (the sponsors of the event), at the Gaddafi Stadium here on Wednesday afternoon.

Zaman, who is member of the ad hoc committee, told mediamen that last year Bangladesh team had also participated in the contest which made the number of teams 23. But this year it had not entered. The Pakistan team for the Sharjah Cup would be selected on basis of performance in the coming championship.

Rs 500,000 would be distributed among the participating teams and players as prize-money. The champion team will get Rs 125,000 while the runner-up team will get Rs 65,000. Losing semifinalists will receive Rs 25,000, each. Best batsman, bowler, wicketkeeper and fielder will be given Rs 5,000, each. For every pool match every team is to be awarded Rs 3,000 and "Man-of-the- Match" for every game will pocket Rs 1,500.

The contest will be held on Round-Robin league system. The teams have been divided into the following four pools:

Pool "A": KCCA Whites, Hyderabad, PNSC, Bahawalpur, PIA and Customs.

Pool "B": LCCA, Gujranwala, LDCA, WAPDA, NBP and HBL.

Pool "C": Faisalabad, Sargodha, ADBP, ABL and KCCA Blues.

Pool "D": Redco, Rawalpindi, Islamabad, Peshawar, KRL.

Top team of each group will qualify for semi-finals. At the Asghar Ali Shah Stadium, Karachi, the top team of pool "A" will play the pre-finals against champion team of pool "C" under floodlights on Oct 8. The same evening, champion team of pool "B" will clash with top team of pool "D" at the Gaddafi Stadium under floodlights. The final will also be held at the Gaddafi Stadium on October 10.

Javed Zaman Khan said that besides the semi-finals and the final, efforts were being made to also get some other important matches of the championship telecast live. In all, 17 matches were expected to be played under floodlights. These matches would be played from 2:30 pm to 6:45 pm and after a break of 45 minutes, from 6:45 pm to 10:15 pm every evening. During the championship coloured clothing and "kookaburra" balls will be used.