June 06, 2007	Wednesday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 20, 1428

LAHORE, June 5: The national selection committee will recommend the names of 30 players for central contract as the basic policy to finalise a draft for the contract was discussed in a special meeting of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on Tuesday.

The meeting, chaired by the PCB chief Dr Nasim Ashraf, was also attended by the selection committee members and other PCB officials.

Later, a PCB spokesman said the ad hoc committee would approve the draft of the contract on June 17 in Bhurban.

A special category is likely to be introduced for those players who had confined themselves to Test or one-day cricket. So far Inzamam-ul-Haq has decided to play Tests only, while Younis Khan is also thinking to participate in the longer version of the game only.

After getting the ad hoc committee’s approval, the central contract would be implemented from July 1.

It was also decided that seniority, discipline, fitness and performance would be considered while awarding the contract to the players. However, there will be very little difference between the amounts to be received by the juniors and seniors, and the main emphasis will be on performance.

Moreover, it was also decided that the selection committee will announce the names of 20 players on Wednesday for the Pakistan camp, which is to be held in Abbottabad from June 10-24.

The final squad for the England tour (ODIs against Scotland and India) will be announced on June 16.

The selectors will also give names of 30 players by the end of June, for submitting those names to the International Cricket Council (ICC) for the Twenty20 World Cup to be held in South Africa in Sept.

It has been decided that players, who are presently playing county cricket with the PCB permission, will be eligible for selection as per the assessment criteria of the selectors.

Meanwhile, the junior and senior selection committees also held a joint meeting to decide about a coordination policy.

Dr Nasim also held a long meeting with Chief Operating Officer Shafqat Naghmi and Director Cricket Operations Zakir Khan over the appointment of coach for the senior team.