PCB hopes India play Pakistan in August, even if at a neutral venue

The Pakistan Cricket Board is pinning its hopes on the BCCI agreeing on play Pakistan, at least at a neutral venue, in August this year in order to boost its financial position.

"In the future tours program India is supposed to tour Pakistan in August. We are hoping that even if they don't tour (the country) for security reasons, they should at least play us at a neutral venue because we badly need revenues from this 'home' series," a source in the board told PTI.

He pointed out that when former Chairman Ijaz Butt left in 2011 there was about 4.2 billion rupees in the PCB coffers.

"This was mainly due to an amount of USD 15 million that we received as our hosting and compensation fees from the ICC for the 2011 World Cup," the source said.

He, however added that since then while expenses of the PCB had increased, revenues had dried up particularly since international teams stopped touring Pakistan.

"Recently the board has received USD 3 million (approximately 30 crore rupees) as its share of the last ICC T20 World Cup. But the expenses are increasing everyday. The board now has to issue fresh central contracts to the players for 2013," he said.

The source said that expenses had increased because the board spent a lot of money supporting the regional teams in domestic cricket.

"Lot of expenses is involved in supporting the regional teams. One example is that each player in a regional team now earns around 18,000 from a match as his fees and daily allowances."

He said administrative expenses, which included central contracts of players, their fees and other benefits, payment to support staff, accounted for a major chunk of the annual expenses of the PCB.

"From the recent Indian tour each player earned approximately 2.5 million to 3 million rupees as match fees, bonuses and awards.

"The board also has to now look towards hosting three series starting with India in August, South Africa in October-November and Sri Lanka in December-January and in all likelihood we will have to play these series at neutral venues. In India's case if they don't agree to play at a neutral venue, the only option left is to tour India that is if we get to keep the revenues from the series," he said.

The source explained that when the board hosted teams at neutral venues like UAE, its projected earnings were slashed by 30 to 40 per cent because obviously earnings from ground rights and other sponsorships were higher if the series was held in Pakistan.

"That is why the board is now hoping that BCCI will understand the financial position of the PCB and respond positively to play our 'home' series in August. As it is we lost a lot of money when India refused to tour Pakistan in early 2009 after the Mumbai terror attacks," the source said.

He pointed out this was one reason why the PCB had agreed to play the recent one-day series in India without any monetary benefits so that the BCCI responded positively for the August series.

The source conceded that hiring of consultants and other expenses for the planned Super League T20 tournament, which has now been postponed, had also added to PCB's expenses.