LAHORE: The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), without the approval of its Board of Governors (BoG), has decided to allow two teams each — from Peshawar and Sialkot regions — to take part in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy and Hanif Mohammad Trophy during the next season.
The BoG, which is the primary body for taking major cricket-related decisions in the country, includes representatives from regions as well as departments, and their input for any important matter is regarded as mandatory. However, the move to increase the number of participating teams in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy — Pakistan’s premier first-class event — without the BoG approval is significantly surprising.
The contentious decision to increase the number of QAT teams was taken during an online meeting held with the participating regions of the last edition of the Hanif Mohammad Trophy on Tuesday.
Earlier, in a similar way, the PCB raised the total number of teams of the previous Quaid-e-Azam Trophy from eight to 10, on the concluding day of the 2025 Hanif Mohammad Trophy in September.
Before the start of the season, the PCB had decided to allow only top six regions of the last season to compete in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy while two outfits were to qualify from last year’s Hanif Mohammad Trophy.
However, when the Hanif Trophy ended the same day, the PCB decided to raise the number of teams in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy to ten but in a controversial manner.
The number of participating teams were raised also to ensure participation of at least one team from Karachi Region in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy as no team of this region could qualify from the Hanif Mohammad Trophy to the next tier — Quaid-e-Azam Trophy -- as Fata and Faisalabad topped their respective groups.
However, the PCB in its first U-turn conveyed a message to all the regional bodies:
“Thanks to the Chairman PCB, approval for promotion of four teams this year has been granted on the request of the DDCO (Director Domestic Cricket). This year four teams, top two teams from each pool, shall be promoted to QAT and there will be relegation of two teams for the next Hanif Mohammad Trophy,” the PCB said.
“According to this decision, besides Fata and Faisalabad as top teams of their respective groups, along with second best Karachi Blues and Lahore Blues were to qualify for the QAT,” it added.
However to one’s surprise, a message from the PCB, issued the next day, stated: “Fata, Karachi Blues, Faisalabad and Multan qualified for QAT under [the] new ruling [excluding Lahore Blues]. Thanks to the Chairman PCB, approval for promotion of four teams this year has been granted on the request of DDCO. This year two teams from each pool shall be promoted to QAT.
“Additionally, the remaining two teams will qualify on the basis of points/combined collectively. There will be relegation of two teams for the next Hanif Mohammad Trophy.”
Interestingly, Peshawar and Sialkot included two players each as guests in the last season of the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy.
For Sialkot, Mohammad Hasnain and Mehran Mumtaz participated as guest players while for Peshawar Sufyan Muqeem and Razaullah were the guest players as both the regions could not finalise one complete team.
A regional president, on the condition of anonymity, told Dawn that two major and traditional regions -- Karachi and Lahore – have held the rights of fielding two teams each for these tournaments since long, mainly because both produced several prominent players for Pakistan’s national team for seven decades. Moreover, he insisted, both the regions have won the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy title several times.
“This PCB decision is also against the ICC rules on discrimination among its member countries under which the two votes each of Australia and England were disallowed in 1993 to maintain indiscrimination among the members,” the president told Dawn.
“Multan and Faisalabad are also important [cricketing] regions, compared to both Peshawar and Sialkot, but they are [being] allowed only one team [each]. So it is not good for cricket if the ICC rules are not being followed if indiscrimination and disparity among the member countries are to be considered,” he added.
Published in Dawn, January 1st, 2026