LAHORE The Pakistan Cricket Board on Monday appointed former cricket captains, Wasim Bari and Aamir Sohail, as Director Administration and Human Resource and Director Academies respectively while Salim Altaf was elevated to the post of Chief Operating Officer.

The appointments were made and approved by a Governing Board meeting which met here under the chairmanship of PCB Chairman,Ijaz Butt. Out of 15 board members, nine attended the meeting.

Salim Altaf, who was previously working as Director General of the Board, has been elevated as COO while Special Assistant to Chairman,Asif Suhail, has been  given the responsibility to head the media department.

“The Governing Board took a number of important decisions besides approving various appointments,”said Salim Altaf at a news conference after the meeting.

He said the Governing Board was of the view that the current annual budget of PCB, nearly Rs2 billion, must be curtailed since Pakistan cricket had suffered due to cancellation of tours of foreign teams and the Champions Trophy.

The annual budget is now being spent on cricket administration, visits of teams and national cricket academy and allied cricket matters.

“All the members of the governing board will be putting up their suggestions and finding ways to curtail the budget and after that the new budget will be presented and implemented from January first next year," he added.

He said the present budget was excessive and it could be reduced by measures, including reviewing various appointments of regional development managers and officers throughout the country by the previous regime of the PCB.

Sources in the governing board confirmed that the posts of managers and officers would be abolished in the new budget as Rs5 million were being spent every month on their salaries.

When asked about the financial irregularities committed by the previous set up of the board,Salim Atlaf did not give a clear answer and said “ it is time to look ahead, setting aside what happened in the past as we will be having a lot of cricket activities at home by hosting India early next year and there is a planned tour of Australia besides hosting Champions trophy in September.

Answering a question, he said, the governing board did not take a decision to abolish the posts of directors to cut down heavy expenses as a decision in this regard would be taken in the next budget.

To a question he expressed the optimism that India would undertake its tour of Pakistan as per schedule in January-February next year and said in case the Indian side might review its decision to visit Pakistan then there were other options to have this series at a natural venue, including England which had offered to stage the series.

“But we want to have this series here and we will convince India to visit Pakistan because it will help in bringing back international cricket to Pakistan and giving some financial stability to PCB," he asserted.

“But at the same time we must look into other options to keep the door open to play international cricket and to keep our team involved in all formats of the game”.