ISLAMABAD, April 30: The Pakistan Tennis Federation (PTF) on Friday reminded Aisamul Haq that issuing press statements was a violation of the code of conduct for players that could prompt action against him.

Secretary Rashid Khan told Dawn that while the PTF wanted Aisam to play this fall's home Davis Cup tie against New Zealand without any preconditions, it was time he refrained from speaking to the press.

"We sincerely want him on the team but giving out statements to the media is certainly not going to help," he said. Aisam, on Friday refuted claims of Saeed Hai, PTF's senior vice president, that he had been paid $40,000 for appearing in Davis Cup ties.

He claimed that only $18,000 were paid to him by the federation for Cup ties over the last six years. "For me my country comes first and I have never tried to create a dispute over payments but it is the PTF which has started a campaign against me."

Aisam is said to be demanding $10,000 for representing Pakistan and another $5000 as win bonus. "We simply cannot afford to give out this kind of money, however we will continue to pay him $2000 along with the air tickets, daily allowance and accommodation."

Without Aisam, Pakistan were blanked 5-0 in ties against Thailand and Taiwan and he is now also not likely to be available for the Sep 24-26 tie in Islamabad. "We had sought his availability and have not heard from him for 10 days now, therefore we presume that he is not interested," Rashid said.

Rashid made it clear that only a part of money coming in from the International Tennis Federation (ITF) was meant for the players. "Roughly about $5000 is given out to them while the rest is sponsorship money."

Aisam on the other hand said that PTF's statements were hurting him. "They are demoralising and painful. I see nothing wrong for a player to make a genuine demand for appearance money out of ITF subsidy."

He called on the PTF not to scandalise and distort the players' image and try and solve the matter in an amicable way. "If you look at the recent history of our tennis, you will see that I have played a key role in earning laurels for the country.

I do not want to take the entire credit for those achievements and want to share that with my team-mates." Aisam felt it was time for the PTF chief Syed Dilawar Abbas to step in and sort out the matter and restrain officials from issuing unfounded statements.