National T20 Cup action begins at Pindi stadium from tomorrow
By;Asghar Ali Mubarak
The 2020–21 National T20 Cup is a Twenty20 domestic cricket competition being played in Pakistan and Pindi Cricket Stadium is ready to host National T20 Cup. It is the seventeenth season of the National T20 Cup, and was started on 30 September 2020 at Multan, and is scheduled to finish on 18 October 2020 at Rawalpindi .The season features an expanded format, with an increase from 18 to 33 matches. With Zimbabwe set to arrive for three One-day Internationals and as many Twenty20 Internationals against Pakistan at the end of October, there are opportunities for a number of fringe cricketers to stake their claims in front of Pakistan head coach-cum-chief selector Misbah-ul-Haq and the head coaches of the six teams who are part of the national selection committee. Pakistan squad for the three One-Day Internationals and three Twenty20 Internationals will be announced here on October 19, a day after the conclusion of the First XI National T20 Cup. Zimbabwe will arrive later this month for the three ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup Super League matches on 30 October, 1 and 3 November in Multan, which will be followed by three T20Is on 7, 8 and 10 November.
A total of 14 fixtures were played at the Multan Cricket Stadium before the event’s second leg starts from Oct 9 at the Pindi Cricket Stadium in Rawalpindi, where another lot of 14 matches are scheduled at the league phase. The top four sides will progress through to the Oct 17 semi-finals, which also will be staged in Rawalpindi along with the final on Oct 18.While PTV Sports would broadcast the entire tournament live, the six outfits will be battling for supremacy to lay their hands on the trophy and the hefty winners’ purse of Rs5 million. The runners-up will receive Rs2.5 million out of the total prize-money of Rs9 million. The tournament is being organized in bio-score bubble with all fixtures to be played behind closed doors under strict protocols because of corona virus (Covid-19) pandemic to ensure health and safety of players and officials involved. The Pakistan Cricket Board is the first cricket board to announce and organize a complete domestic season in these unprecedented and difficult Covid-19 times. The PCB has made comprehensive arrangements for the upcoming season to protect the wellbeing and livelihood of the domestic cricketers. Due to the ongoing pandemic and to ensure health and safety of all competitors, the tournament will be played behind closed doors under strict Covid-19 protocols. The tournament is scheduled in two phases: the first one was starts from 30 September to 6th October in Multan and now the second phase to be staged at Pindi cricket stadium from 9-18 October in Rawalpindi. With two ACC Asia Cups and ICC Men’s T20 World Cups scheduled for the next two years, this year’s National T20 Cup First XI tournament is scheduled on double-league basis to provide adequate preparation to the players who are likely to represent the Pakistan men’s national team in these events. The tournament also providing an opportunity for the country’s best short format cricketers to impress the national selectors and, also, the HBL Pakistan Super League franchise owners and management ahead of the Player Draft for the 2021 season, which is scheduled to be held in November. With a coveted trophy and total prize money of PKR9million on offer, Northern, who is led by Shadab Khan until their captain Imad Wasim (currently engaged in the Vitality Blast T20 tournament in the UK) joins the side in Rawalpindi, will be eager to defend their title. And, the other five teams are fighting tooth and nail to secure berths in the final of the tournament, which will be played at the Pindi Cricket Stadium on 18 October. Pakistan head coach and chief selector Misbah-ul-Haq, bowling Coach Waqar Younis, Head of High Performance Coaching, Grant Bradburn, and Head of International Player Development, Saqlain Mushtaq, watching the matches as part of their responsibility to scout the young talent, help the coaching staff and bridge communication gap between the domestic cricket and High Performance Centre. . Earlier the hosted test matches at Rawalpindi against Sri Lanka Bangladesh and the Sri Lanka Pakistan was severely affected by the rain in December. The Meteorological Department did not make any forecast for the coming week, but the field had poorly maintained management.
As per the overhauled structure, six teams are participating in the competition, with each team playing 10 games in the double round-robin leg.With no international cricket going on for Pakistan currently, until the series against Zimbabwe, some of the top players of the country are available.These players likes Haris Sohail, Babar Azam, Kamran Akmal, Naseem Shah, Mohammad Rizwan, Junaid Khan, Fakhar Zaman, Iftikhar Ahmed, Mohammad Hafeez, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Shoaib Malik, Imad Wasim, Shadab Khan, Sarfaraz Ahmed, Shan Masood, Khushdil Shah and Mohammad Abbas are inform and giving good results. The first half of the competition was played in Multan, after which the teams are now moved for Rawalpindi. Earlier the tournament begins with the clash between defending champions Northern and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Multan on opening day on September 30.
The squads of all teams:
Balochistan – Haris Sohail (captain), Bismillah Khan (vice-captain, wicketkeeper), Akbar-ur-Rehman, Akif Javed, Ammad Butt, Awais Zia, Imam-ul-Haq, Imran Butt, Imran Farhat, Kashif Bhatti, Khurram Shahzad, Taimur Khan, Umaid Asif, Umar Gul, Usama Mir and Yasir Shah.
Central Punjab – Babar Azam (captain), Saad Nasim (vice-captain), Abdullah Shafiq, Abid Ali, Ahmed Bashir, Bilal Asif, Ehsan Adil, Faheem Ashraf, Irfan Khan Niazi, Kamran Akmal (wicketkeeper), Naseem Shah, Qasim Akram, Rizwan Hussain, Sohaibullah, Usman Qadir and Zafar Gohar.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa – Mohammad Rizwan (captain, wicketkeeper), Junaid Khan (vice-captain), Arshad Iqbal, Asif Afridi, Fakhar Zaman, Iftikhar Ahmed, Imran Khan Snr, Mohammad Hafeez, Mohammad Haris (wicketkeeper), Mohammad Mohsin, Sahibzada Farhan, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Shoaib Malik, Usman Khan Shinwari, Wahab Riaz and Zohaib Khan.
Northern – Imad Wasim (captain), Shadab Khan (vice-captain), Ali Imran, Asif Ali, Farzan Raja, Haider Ali, Hammad Azam, Haris Rauf, Mohammad Amir, Mohammad Nawaz, Musa Khan, Rohail Nazir (wicketkeeper), Sohail Akhtar, Sohail Tanvir, Umar Amin and Zeeshan Malik
Sindh – Sarfaraz Ahmed (captain, wicketkeeper), Saud Shakeel (vice-captain), Ahsan Ali, Anwar Ali, Asad Shafiq, Azam Khan, Danish Aziz, Hassan Khan, Khurram Manzoor, Mir Hamza, Mohammad Asghar, Mohammad Hasnain, Mohammad Taha, Rumman Raees, Sharjeel Khan and Sohail Khan.
Southern Punjab – Shan Masood (captain), Hussain Talat (vice-captain), Aamir Yamin, Ali Shafiq, Bilawal Bhatti, Khushdil Shah, Mohammad Abbas, Mohammad Ilyas, Mohammad Irfan, Rahat Ali (subject to fitness), Saif Baddar, Sohaib Maqsood, Umer Khan, Umar Siddiq Khan, Zahid Mehmood and Zeeshan Ashraf (wicketkeeper).
Northern cricket team are the defending champions.On 9 September 2020, the PCB confirmed all the squads for the tournament. Central Punjab cricketer Salman Butt refused to take part in the tournament, after he was demoted from the team’s first XI. Later in September 2020, Sindh’s Rumman Raees was ruled out of the tournament due to a spinal injury, with Ghulam Mudassar named as his replacement. In Central Punjab’s squad, Ali Shan replaced Fahim Ashraf, who was ruled out of the tournament due to fitness issues, and Mohammad Ismail replaced Imad Wasim in Northern’s squad, for the matches in Multan. At the back of the Zimbabwe series, the PCB will stage the remaining four matches of the HBL Pakistan Super League on 14, 15 and 17 November, while the Pakistan cricket team will depart for New Zealand on 23 November for the series, which begins in Auckland with the first T20I on 18 December. The remaining two T20Is will be played in Hamilton and Napier on 20 and 22 December, while the two Tests will be held in Mount Maunganui and Christchurch from 26-30 December and 3-7 January.
After their return from New Zealand, Pakistan will play host to South Africa for two Tests and three T20Is, schedule of which is yet to be announced. Pakistan will then visit Zimbabwe in April for two Tests and three T20Is.
It is being anticipated that on their way to Zimbabwe, Pakistan may take a stopover in South Africa to play three ODIs and three T20Is, which were scheduled in October 2020 but were postponed by Cricket South Africa due to high number of Covid-19 cases in their country.
06-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
14th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 6 2020, National T20 Cup
Balochistan v Northern
09-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
15th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 9 2020, National T20 Cup
Northern v Central Punjab
09-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
16th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 9 2020, National T20 Cup
Sindh v Southern Punjab
10-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
17th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 10 2020, National T20 Cup
Balochistan v Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
10-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
18th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 10 2020, National T20 Cup
Central Punjab v Sindh
11-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
19th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 11 2020, National T20 Cup
Northern v Southern Punjab
11-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
20th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 11 2020, National T20 Cup
Balochistan v Sindh
12-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
21st Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 12 2020, National T20 Cup
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa v Southern Punjab
12-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
22nd Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 12 2020, National T20 Cup
Balochistan v Central Punjab
13-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
23rd Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 13 2020, National T20 Cup
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa v Sindh
13-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
24th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 13 2020, National T20 Cup
Central Punjab v Southern Punjab
14-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
25th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 14 2020, National T20 Cup
Northern v Sindh
14-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
26th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 14 2020, National T20 Cup
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa v Central Punjab
15-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
27th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 15 2020, National T20 Cup
Balochistan v Northern
15-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
28th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 15 2020, National T20 Cup
Sindh v Southern Punjab
16-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
29th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 16 2020, National T20 Cup
Northern v Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
16-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
30th Match, Rawalpindi, Oct 16 2020, National T20 Cup
Balochistan v Southern Punjab
17-OCT-2020, 03:30 PM
1st Semi-Final, Rawalpindi, Oct 17 2020, National T20 Cup
17-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
2nd Semi-Final, Rawalpindi, Oct 17 2020, National T20 Cup
18-OCT-2020, 08:00 PM
Final, Rawalpindi, Oct 18 2020, National T20 Cup
