LAHORE - The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) rebutted in the strongest terms the story published in the newspaper on November 18, 2013 under the title, “Hafeez failure forced Sethi to go defensive”. The story is a deliberate attempt to mislead and defame the PCB. It is malicious in nature as it is built around a speculation that is unfounded and not substantiated.
It is clarified that quite contrary to the assertion in the story that he wants to remove the incumbent skipper Misbah-ul-Haq and replace M Hafeez as captain of the Pakistan national team, Najam Sethi never spoke to any member of the media on the issue, nor did he have any plans to do that.
Secondly, every field reporting covering cricket is aware of the selection procedure of the national squad as the selection is carried out by the national selection committee with input from the captain and the coach. The PCB chief, as head of the organisation, only approves the squad. Hence blaming the chairman for something which does not fall under his direct purview is baseless. The PCB regrets the publication of the story and considers it an attempt to bring the PCB into disrepute.