October 25, 2007	Thursday	Shawwal 12, 1428

KARACHI, Oct 24: Arif Ali Khan Abbasi, former chief executive of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), joined the Karachi City Cricket Association (KCCA) and the city fans on Wednesday in expressing the disappointment over shifting the fifth One-day International between Pakistan and South Africa from Karachi to Lahore.

“When there was a bomb blast in London no itinerary was changed,” Arif said. “It was the same when a blast went off in Colombo while New Zealanders were touring Sri Lanka.”

“Karachi is a hub of cricket and marketing activity. The South African squad spent ten days (for the first match of the Test series) here and there nicely without any worry,” he remarked.

“The PCB officials should have convinced the South African management as people of this premier Test centre (Karachi) enjoy cricket and love cricketers,” he added.

The match was scheduled to be held at the National Stadium on Oct 29 but has been shifted to Lahore on Wednesday because of security reasons.

Proteas’ team management and security officials touring with the team were not keen to play in Karachi following a twin bomb blasts that killed 140 people and injured around 500 on Oct 18.

Meanwhile, the KCCA also stated its disappointment over switching venue for the final game of the South Africa series.

“It’s definitely a setback for us because after recent developments we were hoping South Africa will play in Karachi,” Secretary KCCA Siraj-ul-Islam Bukhari said. “After peacefully staging the first Test we expected the local fans to enjoy Pakistan-South Africa fireworks in the final one-dayer but that was not to be,” he maintained dejectedly.

“Karachi has returned to normalcy (after the Oct 18 incident) and hosting of the ODI could have changed the mood of the city which is country’s major cricket centre,” he said.

Cricket fans in Karachi, naturally, have also been upset by the venue switch.

“We were eagerly waiting to buy tickets for this match but its shifting has broken our hearts,” said brothers Shakeel Akhtar and Rizwan Akhtar.

“The South Africans faced no security problems during their ten-day stay here in Karachi and we thought they would play the one-dayer too but their decision denied us the ODI action,” they added.

“It’s really bad. People of Karachi love cricket and there has been no untoward incident in many years at the stadium (during international games),” Gohar Razi, another cricket lover said .—APP