LAHORE, Nov 20: A good number of national cricketers, including Pakistan captain Shoaib Malik, have preferred to miss the last round match of the on-going Pentangular Cup, making evident their disinterest in domestic cricket.

The Punjab team which is led by Pakistan captain Shoaib Malik suffered a big blow when it was learnt that besides the skipper, other noted cricketers namely Salman Butt, Kamran Akmal and Saeed Ajmal are also not playing against the NWFP at the Gaddafi Stadium, apparently, due to their late arrival from UAE after featuring in the West Indies series.

However, on the other hand, Younis Khan (NWFP), Sohail Tanvir, Rao Iftikhar (Islamabad) and Abdur Rauf (Balochistan) — who also represented Pakistan in the Abu Dhabi contest — joined their respective provincial teams soon after their arrival home, displaying their commitment to the important event of domestic cricket.

Though the match between Punjab and NWFP is of academic nature since the home side is at the bottom in the five-team first-class event, all the cricketers opting out of the match have missed a good opportunity to get some competitive cricket ahead of the challenging India series at home next year.

Surprisingly, Shoaib, who should have given his availability for the last match to show his seriousness for the first-class cricket and to inspire others, is in the city but has not bothered to make an appearance.