KARACHI, March 12: All the leading hotels of the city began to burst at the seams on Friday as droves of cricket enthusiasts flew in to watch what is widely expected to be a gruelling contest between traditional rivals India and Pakistan.

A spokeswoman for Sheraton told Dawn that at least 35 members of the Indian cricket team were staying at the hotel.

She added that elaborate arrangements had been made at the hotel to screen the match on a large TV set. She said the occupancy of all the leading hotels of the city had been at least 90 per cent for the past three months.

Representatives of other hotels and clubs also said that they had made special arrangements to screen the match.

The Karachi DIG operations, Tariq Jamil, said more security personnel had been deployed at the city hotels to provide security to foreigners.

"No cars are allowed to be parked in the hotels and more snap checking of vehicles on routes leading to the hotels would be done," he said.

Three cinemas - Scala, Bambino and Universal - were all-set to screen the match. These cinemas, which could accommodate over 1,300 cricket buffs at a time, are charging from Rs100 to Rs500.