Karachi, April 24: Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) ad hoc chairman Shaharyar M. Khan on Sunday urged Pakistani players to maintain their fitness and take rest in the meantime before the high profile tour of England, starting from June.

Talking to reporters at the National Stadium, PCB chief said that during the gap between the full-fledged series against England, players must take rest and avoid playing cricket and should focus on their fitness.

“It will be a tough series of England and after playing excessive cricket in recent months players need complete rest to get fully fit for the series”, PCB chief said.

He said that PCB would also ask the players to avoid playing county cricket before the England tour in order to assure complete rest for the players.

He said the players would undergo a fitness camp that will be set before the training camp for the series to prove their fitness.

Terming Shahid Afridi's decision to temporary retirement from Test cricket as an emotional one, PCB chief said that he would talk to the flamboyant all rounder personally on his decision.

“He (Shahid) was one of the main player of Test team since past few months and I will talk him personally to know the exact nature of his decision”, added Shaharyar.

Afridi announced his temporary retirement from Test cricket earlier this month till the next World Cup in West Indies in 2007 making himself unavailable for England Test matches.

On hosting World Cup 2011, he said that expectations were high that Asian would win the bid as it has a strong case. Asia is facing stiff competition from Australia and New Zealand for hosting the sports mega event.

Meanwhile, National Stadium Karachi (NSK) will be connected with the proposed flyover being built by City District Government Karachi (CDGK) at NSK to ensure smooth entry of players and VIPs into the stadium.

In this connection, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed and copies of the agreement were exchanged on Monday.

Shaharyar and City Nazim, Syed Mustafa Kamal, signed the MoU.

“National Stadium will be the first of its kind in the world where players can directly enter through a bridge (to be linked to the proposed flyover),” the city nazim said.

The nazim unveiled details of project which would use some of the land of the NSK, saying this land was vital for the project and without it, completion of the flyover would be very difficult.

He said that the NSK flyover was the vital part of the signal-free corridor from SITE to airport to be established by CDGK and added that in return for the stadium land, CDGK would reconstruct inner roads of the stadium, besides providing other facilities. —Agencies