LAHORE, April 16: Pakistan coach Javed Miandad has taken  exception to promoting regional cricket instead of departmental at domestic level.

Talking to reporters at Gaddafi Stadium on Wednesday, Miandad said that departments had produced a good number of great cricketers and spent millions of rupees on them.

“On the regional basis who will pay the cricketers? And under such situation parents will not allow their children to play cricket,” he argued.

He pointed out that players were already coming in less numbers from the big cities as the parents of those regions were stressing  more  on studies of their children.

He added that a good number of players were coming from small cities and if they would not find job opportunities on the basis of the game they would be discouraged.

Miandad, under whose guidance Pakistan won the Sharjah Cup, admitted that he was not expecting such a good performance from the players.

However, he added that the performance would improve further in  the forthcoming triangular tournament in Sri Lanka, which also involves New Zealand.

Miandad said that a strategy had been chalked out for the short Sri Lankan tour and it did not matter what kind of wickets were there.

“We have to play on all kinds of soil and therefore a particular country does not matter,” he added.

To a question he said that there should not be undue reshuffling of players time and again.

Miandad noted that Mohammad Zahid should have been given  a chance in the Sharjah Cup. But he added he could not say about the injury-plagued fast bowler who had been ignored for the last two years. “It is better you ask this question from the  previous management.”

He asserted that selection of the team was not  his responsibility as it was the job of the selection committee. “I can only put my views before the selection committee.”