By Farooq Ahmad

ISLAMABAD, May 19 (APP): The newly-appointed Pakistan cricket coach Mickey Arthur will need to come up with innovative, new ideas to gel the team together and make it a force to reckon with in international cricket.

He will have to lift the players from the morale-sagging effects of recent disappointments and achieve successes in international arena–in all three versions of the game.

Mickey is by no means the maiden foreign-born coach appointed to raise the fortunes of Pakistan cricket team but will have to tread carefully on the treacherous track–a sobriquet the team has earned for itself over the years.

QUETTA, May 19 (APP): Chairman, Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), Sheharyar Khan on Thursday said that as law and order situation in Quetta has improved it was considering to invite Afghanistan cricket team to revive international cricket here.

The Chairman PCB, along with Secretary General Quetta Region, Noman Mashkoor and PCB Coordinator, Abdul Qayyum, was addressing a press conference at Bugti Cricket Stadium Quetta.

Sheharyar said that Afghanistan has shown consent to send their cricket team to Pakistan. “We are considering to arrange matches here to provide locals an oppurtunity to watch international cricket”.

ISLAMABAD, May 19 (APP): The 62nd National Wrestling
Championship (Free Style) and 6th Beach Championship will be held from May 26-29 in Gujranwala.

Secretary Pakistan Wrestling Federation Arshad Sattar told APP on Thursday that as many as ten teams from all over the country would take part in these two events.

The teams include Pakistan Railway, Pakistan Army, Pakistan
WAPDA, Pakistan Police, Punjab, KPK, Balochistan, Sindh, Islamabad and FATA.

ISLAMABAD, May 19 (APP): Pakistan head coach Mickey Arthur feels that if there would be a role for Shahid Afridi in Pakistan cricket then he will be brought back.

Mickey said Afridi has been a fantastic player for Pakistan for many years and you don’t discard phenomenal players like that very easily.

“If we think there is a role for him we will certainly bring him back but that is a discussion for the future and another time.

ISLAMABAD, May 19 (APP): Batsman Fawad Alam and opener Shaan Masood are said to be the fittest players in the training camp kept in preparation for the England tour underway at the Kakul Military Academy.

Talking to APP, a Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) official said
that Fawad and Shaan have topped the fitness tests and are the fittest players among others. “Despite age test captain Misbah-ul-Haq and batsman Younis Khan are also among the toppers in the fitness tests.”

“As many as 31 players are attending the camp and mostly a dozen of them have been unable to meet the criteria of the fitness tests and have been unsuccessful to pass it,” he said.

ISLAMABAD, May 19 (APP): England and Wales Cricket Board (EWCB) director Andrew Strauss has announced that a points system crossing all formats will be used for the matches against Sri Lanka and Pakistan this summer.

The ‘Super Series’ will get underway when the international
summer begins with the first Test between England and Sri Lanka at Headingley on Thursday.

As is traditional, individual series trophies will still be at
stake for the Tests, one-day internationals and one-off Twenty20 internationals against both tourists.