November 25, 2003	Tuesday	Ramazan 29, 1424

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LAHORE, Nov 24: Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on Monday bowed to the demand of its affiliated departments and decided to increase the number of teams to 12 from eight for the next month’s Patron’s Trophy.

Earlier, only two teams each from four groups were to qualify for the main round, but now three teams have been allowed. The tournament was to start from Dec 1 but now its Pool “A” matches will begin from Dec 7 and Pool “B” from Dec 14. Bangladesh “A” team will be the 13th team of the contest.

A PCB’s DCMC spokesman disclosed that the decision was taken following requests by National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) and Habib Bank (HBL) who had failed to qualify for the tournament proper.

“Past performances and contributions of particularly HBL and NBP for the promotion of the game in the country have been taken into account. As regards PTCL and DHA good luck to them in the first class cricket but PCB also appreciates their efforts of hiring young boys.

“The objective of PCB is to have a competitive domestic season. But at the same time it wants to see the cricketers getting employment and securing their futures. The board is pleased to see that this season a lot of young cricketers have been hired by the departments,” the spokesman added.

The other teams which got the benefit of the decision are debutants DHA (Pool “A”) and PTCL (Pool “B”).

Pools: Pool “A”: PIA, Customs, DHA, Wapda, KRL, PTCL, Bangladesh A.

Pool “B”: ZTBL, KPT, NBP, Sui Gas, ABL and HBL.

“The revise draws of the tournament will be released on Friday but it has been decided that Pool A matches will be played in Karachi and Hyderabad while Rawalpindi and Peshawar will host the Pool B ties that will begin from Dec 14,” the spokesman said.

According to the new format, there will be 37 first-class matches as compared to 36 in the previous format. The additional match is the final. The only difference will be that in the previous format, each team was guaranteed eight matches while now, the Pool “A” teams will get a minimum of six matches while Pool B teams a minimum of five.