Former England international Moeen Ali said that the England and Wales Cricket Board must protect the Pakistani players’ rights to play the Hundred, adding that players will take appropriate actions if the Pak cricketers are boycotted by the Indian-owned franchises of the league.
The Hundred, a format that has 100 balls in an innings, has four teams owned by Indian companies – Manchester Super Giants (RPSG Group), MI London (Reliance), Southern Brave (GMR) and Sunrisers Leeds (Sun Group) and according to the reports in the British media, all of them would avoid Pakistani players.
“In the UK, I’m not sure that can happen – and I hope it doesn’t happen. It just shouldn’t happen, hopefully it won’t happen. We just have to wait and see if it does, but I think it’d be a massive shame, and I’m sure the ECB will definitely keep an eye out,” Moeen said to The Telegraph.
“There’ll be a group of players that will speak up. There’ll be things done about it. I think players should speak up. Anyone that has any sort of concern for these kind of things – it doesn’t matter if they have Pakistani heritage – should speak up. Obviously, the news is very new. So I’ve not really had a chance to speak to anyone, but most of the players would be on the same page. It’d be really interesting to see what happens, because I genuinely think other countries can do what they want, obviously we’re not in control of those things, but in the UK, we have a bit more say about these things,” he added.
On Monday, Pakistan’s Sahibzada Farhan had said that the decision to play in the hundred was not in their hands.
“See, it’s not in our hands to decide who will pick us or not. That is not in our hands. Wherever we get a chance, who are interested can pick us and we are ready to play in that league,” Farhan said ahead of his team’s T20 World Cup Super Eight match against England here on Tuesday. “And we are not interested to play with the people – the way you have spoken,” said Farhan when asked about Pakistan players not being picked in franchise leagues around the world with strong IPL ties.
