PESHAWAR: Pakistan Cricket Board Level-III Coach and Cricket Coordinator for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Hajra Sarwar Thursday said that the open trials to select women cricketers in three different categories including U19, Emerging, and Senior would be held on August 29 here at Maazullah Khan Cricket Academy, inside Qayyum Sports Complex Peshawar.

Hajra Sarwar, the only female qualified coach who did her Level-III from Australia and is now associated with Pakistan Cricket Board for Peshawar Region, said that all arrangements in this connection have been made.

She said a request has been made to Director General Sports Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Khalid Mehmood to ensure hostel facilities for those women cricketers coming from Dera Ismail Khan to Chitral for the opening trials to be conducted under the aegis of Pakistan Cricket Board in Peshawar like other big cities across Pakistan.

She said it is golden opportunities for women cricketers to be part of the trials and do their efforts to select. She said the Pakistan Cricket Board is not giving central contracts even at the District and Regional levels which would also boost women cricket in Pakistan.

It is a good chance for the women cricketers to appear in the trials for the selection of Under-19 and Senior teams as well from Peshawar Region.

She said, the Pakistan Cricket Board, as part of its continuous effort to unearth women cricketers at the grassroots level, will hold a nationwide women’s cricket trials, across eight cricket academies from 23 to 31 August.

These trials will provide an exceptional platform for talented female cricketers from various age categories to showcase their skills and progress to the higher levels of the game, Hajra Sawar added.

The trials, she said, would be conducted by the National Selection Committee, which comprises chairperson and former Test cricketer Saleem Jaffar, former international cricketers Asmavia Iqbal and Marina Iqbal.

The trials will be conducted for three age groups including U19, in which players who are born on or after September 1, 2004 are eligible, an Emerging Team and Seniors categories respectively, Hajra Sawar said.

About the trials, she said, it would help the selectors identify talent and select squads for Pakistan Emerging and Pakistan U19 teams. Pakistan Emerging side will compete against West Indies Emerging team at home in October this year, while Pakistan U19 will feature in a triangular event involving Bangladesh and Sri Lanka in Bangladesh in January 2024.

She disclosed that Pakistan Cricket Board have recently awarded first-ever domestic contracts to 74 women cricketers among them three players hailing from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, setting the tone for a brighter future in women’s cricket. With the nationwide trials, we are eagerly poised to bring in a new wave of talented individuals forward, Hajra said.

“We have a great and exciting amount of women’s cricket events ahead, and these trials will help us identify splendid talent that the selectors can consider for the national teams’ squads, ” Hajra Sarwar, hailing from District Swabi, said.

About the schedule of the trials issued by the Pakistan Cricket Board Domestic Cricket, the trials, she said would be organized in eight academies including Maazullah Khan Cricket Academy, Peshawar, Qayyum Sports Complex.

She said besides Peshawar, the trials will also be organized in Mohammad High Performance Centre, Karachi, Inzamam-ul-Haq High Performance Centre, Multan, Women Sports Stadium, Bahawalpur, Kinnaird College for Women, Lahore, Pindi Cricket Stadium, Rawalpindi/Islamabad, Abbottabad Stadium, Abbottabad, Bugti Stadium, Quetta and Qayyum Stadium, Peshawar.

Published in The Daily National Courier, August, 25 2023

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