ISLAMABAD - Paramount Group of Companies hosted a grand reception in honour of newly-crowned Quaid-e-Azam Trophy champions Rawalpindi Region and runners-up Islamabad Region at a local hotel.
Rawalpindi and Islamabad Regions players, coaches, presidents of different clubs and other dignitaries attended the reception. A beautiful crystal trophy and shields were also presented to Rawalpindi Region skipper Baber Naeem. Speaking on the occasion, Baber thanked Paramount for hosting such an organised reception in their honour and highlighted coach Sabih Azhar's significant role in helping Rawalpindi win the prestigious event for the very first time. Rawalpindi had achieved this distinction without any star player in their ranks and despite not having their own ground but it was by all means a memorable victory.
“Islamabad players have a number of international standard grounds, where they can not only practice well but also play a number of matches but unfortunately, we don't even have a practice ground available, as in the past, there was a cricket ground where a number of teams used to play, but the ground was allocated to PAF for residential purposes. It is my humble request to Punjab Chief Minister Mian Shahbaz Sharif to allocate a piece of land to Rawalpindi, where a ground should be constructed, as this region possess tremendous amount of talent, which could be utilized for national team,” he added.
COO Paramount group Imran Malik termed the Quaid Trophy victory for both Rawalpindi-Islamabad Regions as a great achievement and hoped the teams would continue producing qualify results to earn good name for their regions and the country. Ex-Sialkot Region president Malik Zulfiqar congratulated both the teams for playing the final and termed match-fixing allegations against Sialkot as completely baseless and demanded accuser to provide evidences instead of going into media. Basit should have informed that incident to the PCB, as the board was the watchdog to keep check and balance and if found any wrongdoing, they should have decided the fate of the culprits.