October 31, 2003	Friday	Ramazan 4, 1424

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KARACHI, Oct 30: Host Pakistan will take on Bangladesh in their opening league match in the Asia Cup Under-19 at National Stadium on Friday.

The four-nation event also involving India and Sri Lanka is being simultaneously played at Karachi and Lahore with final slated at Gaddafi Stadium Lahore on Nov 6.

Top two teams after league rounds will qualify to play in the final in Lahore.

Opening batsman Khalid Latif is leading Pakistan while opener Muhammad Nafees Iqbal Khan is the captain of Bangladesh.

Former Pakistan paceman and now team coach Aqib Javed rated his side very highly and claimed that many of the youngsters from the team would soon be drafted in senior side in future.

“This is the best teenage side for years, with a lot of batting depth and fine pace-cum-spin attack”, he said.

“Pakistan boys are well trained and well groomed in various regional academies and we expect good performance from them”, Aqib maintained. “Technique wise this is the best side because of good coaching in academies”, he added.

He said Pakistan pace attack comprises Riaz Afridi, Wahab Riaz, Imran Ali Pasha and Uzair-ul-Haq. “We got a lot of bowling options”, he said.

“Another player to watch is young leg spinner Mansoor Amjad”, he added. Mansoor was among Pakistan 16 for the Faisalabad Test against South Africa.

Bangladesh team got a number of promising batsmen in their line up and particularly Nafees Iqbal, who scored a hundred against England in a three-day game is their key batsman.

Muhammad Enamul Haque will be other batsman to watch. Nafees is nephew of former Bangladesh skipper and now under-19 coach Akram Khan.

Bangladesh’s Australian coach Richard John McInnes believed that his boys possessed lots of promise and they were keen to learn. “They have shown enthusiasm to pick and learn the things quickly” he said.

Richard, who took the charge of the team five weeks ago, said his team’s strength was in batting department.

Commenting on other teams, he said he had no clue because he had not seen any one playing.

He described the conditions in Karachi much better than the hot and humid Dhaka.

The matches of the tournament will be of 50 overs each side and played in coloured clothing and white balls.

S.K. Sharma (India) and Gamini Silva (Sri Lanka) will supervise the match while Taslim Arif (Pakistan) will be the match referee.

Teams from the following:

Pakistan: Khalid Latif (capt), Sohail Ahmed, Khurram Manzoor, Jahangir Mirza, Shahid Yousuf, Muhammad Altaf, Salman Qadir, Mansoor Amjad, Riaz Afridi, Wahab Riaz, Ali Imran Pasha, Zulqarnain Haider (wickek- keeper), Tariq Mahmood, Uzair-ul-Haq.

Bangladesh: Muhammad Nafees Iqbal Khan (capt), Muhammad Naeem Islam, Muhammad Nizamuddin, Aftab Ahmed Chowdhury, Shahriar Nafees Ahmed, Muhammad Abdul Bashar Shaikh, Arafat Sunny, Gazi Sahagir Hossain Pavel (wicket- keeper), Nidif Chowdhury, Mir Ifti Khair-ul-Islam, Muhammad Rubaiyat Huq, Muhammad Enamul Haque, Muhammad Zia-ur-Rehman, Kazi Shahadat.—APP

Our Lahore Sports Correspondent adds: The decision not to allocate Indian matches at Karachi in the four-nation Asia Cup U-19 was taken by the Asian Cricket Council (ACC).

This was stated by a Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) official at a joint press conference attended by the participating team officials on Thursday.

The official said PCB did not foresee any problem to arrange an Indian match at Karachi as it could have also helped the board  to observe the situation before hosting Indian senior team there in its planned tour next year.

Indian coach Robin Singh said that he was unaware why a match  was not scheduled at Karachi and added his team would have played in that city if it was included in the itinerary.

Robin said that he was in favour of frequent exchanges of teams between two countries as it would promote the game.

He remarked that the four-nation tournament would help  all  the participating teams to prepare for the next year’s World Cup to be held at Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Sri Lankan manager Rohan Korey urged unity among Asian countries to earn more victories at the world level and hoped that an Asian team would win next year’s World Junior Cup.

The Sri Lankan manager said that they were not facing any security problems and added the law and order situation was not exemplary in all the cities of any country and Sri Lanka was also in a similar situation.

“We should learn from the past while focussing on the future,” Rohan added.

Both teams held practice sessions at Gaddafi Stadium. The Indian team did practice in the morning while Sri Lankans in the afternoon.