Old Horses

Old Stallions did the job for Sialkot, but even though they are the sixth time winner, Rawalpindi Rams do require standing ovation for showing signs of improvements.

Even though, Sialkot Stallions won Faysal Bank T20 2011 held at National Stadium, Karachi, but sorry to say, Sialkot do not deserve to be applauded for this achievement, because most of their players have international experience, and like I say, are old-horses and they're of no with the young boys of Rawalpindi Rams. International experience matters alot, no one can't deny that fact, so a team which had 6 players in the final-lineup which was playing against the Rams, who are also part of Pakistan National Cricket side or were part of or were engaged with Australian Big Bash down-under. So was the competition on equality?

Kudos to Rams for showing a continuous and consistent performance from Faisalabad down to Karachi. Rams were the team whose average age in the team was under 30 years in comparison to a team whose main guns were either in their booming 30s or passed.

Look at here, a team whose half of the team is based internationally, on the contrary Rams were the team who had Sohail Tanvir, Umer Amin and Hammad Azam as their internationally played assets, still they were the last time Super8 winners at Faisalabad and finalists in Karachi. I thought such tournaments were for grooming youngsters, instead of giving lifeline to the older ones.

If guys at PCB go that way, than I fear there won't be motivation left for the youngsters to perform. Just look at the other side of the border at east of Pakistan, they've been utilizing the talents they are getting from IPL and CLT20, and got players like Virat Kohli and Amit Mishra to name some, and they've been acting professionally by strengthening their bench-strength, they hired international coaches for the domestic circuits, unlike us who hire international coaches for National Team instead of hiring them at the grass root level.

Like the way we act at the time of floods in Sindh, with no planning although even a common man like me knew such catastrophe might happen but the guys who were to be responsible about it never act on time, similar is the case with Cricket, this current tournament at Karachi was great one, it was a crowd and sponsor puller as well, but still PCB has been taking this tournament as a formality, not more than that, instead of taking it an opportunity to groom youngsters and upgrade ground facilities on regular, which they aren't.

When are we gonna plan on long-term scale! A question, which answer is kinda gloomy to find way out.