Thirty-two teams to compete in HBL Inter-school Cricket

Published September 16, 2014
KARACHI: Habib Bank’s Aman Aziz Siddiqui (second left) addresses a media conference. Also pictured are Nadeem Omar, Fawad Ijaz Khan, Alamgir Ahmed and 
Ali A. Rahim.
KARACHI: Habib Bank’s Aman Aziz Siddiqui (second left) addresses a media conference. Also pictured are Nadeem Omar, Fawad Ijaz Khan, Alamgir Ahmed and Ali A. Rahim.

KARACHI: A total of 32 teams including two representing Habib Bank will compete in the HBL Inter-school Cricket Tournament that begins in the metropolis from Thursday.

The competition is being organised by the Pakistan Veteran Cricket Association (PVCA) and sponsored by Habib Bank Limited. Fawad Ijaz Khan, chairman PVCA, will addressing a media conference at the Karachi Gymkhana on Monday, said that the organisers were flooded with requests from many educational institutions who wanted to participate in the event.

“But unfortunately we had to turn them down because we are not in a position to organise the tournament on a much bigger scale,” he said. “There were many schools outside Karachi who requested to compete but we told them to wait until the next time.”

Fawad told the gathering that a total of 55 matches would be played at six different grounds in the city from Sept 18 to Nov 27 with both the semi-finals and final — to be staged at the Karachi Gymkhana Ground - slated to be televised by Pakistan Television.

The opening fixture will be played between Group ‘F’ teams — St Paul’s School and Rangers Public School — at the Karachi Gymkhana Ground on Thursday.

He further revealed that Sajid Abbasi, a former first-class cricketer, has been assigned the task to carry out the scrutiny process to ascertain players competing are born on or after Sept 1, 1997 and that they are genuine students of the school who are going to represent their respective institutions in the tournament.

Former first-class cricketers Ilyas Khan and Babar Basharat have been nominated as match referees.

Speaking on the occasion, Aman Aziz Siddiqui, head of HBL’s Strategy and Investment, pledged the bank’s support in shape of sponsorship.

“We see this partnership as a stepping stone because sports are an integral part of education. The future Younis Khans and Shahid Afridis will come from school cricket,” Aman observed.

“Our involvement in this tournament was imperative. We are fielding two HBL teams, Greens and Whites, in which young boys from schools not competing here will have to chance to show their true worth in HBL colours.”

Those present on the occasion included Karachi Gymkhana president Ali A. Rahim, prominent sports promoter Nadeem Omar, HBL sports chief Abdul Raqeeb, Alamgir Ahmed and Iqbal Umer.

Following are the pools:

Group ‘A’: HBL Schoolboys Whites, Behbud Boys Secondary School, Ladybird Grammar School, Foundation Public School.

Group ‘B’: Habib Public School, Army Public School, Fatimiyah Boys School, Beaconhouse School System.

Group ‘C’: Kamran Public School, Aga Khan Higher Secondary School, Falconhouse Grammar School, Azeem Academy.

Group ‘D’: Fahad Academy, New Standard Grammar School, Zeeshan Public School, Qadri Model School.

Group ‘E’: St Patrick’s High School, Karachi Grammar School, Civil Aviation Authority School, Beaconhouse School System North Nazimabad.

Group ‘F’: St Paul’s High School, Karachi Public School, Happy Home School, Rangers Public School.

Group ‘G’: Fahim School System, Ibrahim Ali Bhai School, Qamar-e-Bani Hashim School, Khan Secondary School.

Group ‘H’: HBL Schoolboys Greens, New Oxford Grammar School, The City School, The Metropolitan Academy.

Published in Dawn, September 16th , 2014

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