BCCI president not to visit Pak for ACC meeting: Ashraf

     LAHORE, Sept 21:

BCCI President N Srinivasan has turned down an invitation to attend the Asian Cricket Council (ACC) development committee meeting to be held in Islamabad on September 24, informed PCB chairman Zaka Ashraf.

     Ashraf told reporters here that Srinivasan would not be visiting Pakistan and instead has nominated a vice-president of the BCCI to attend the meeting.

     “He apparently has some other assignments and therefore he has nominated one of the vice-presidents of the BCCI to attend the meeting,” Ashraf said.

     “The ACC meeting is a good platform for direct talks between Pakistan and Indian cricket officials and revival of bilateral cricket matches,” he said.

     The PCB chief said the ACC meeting would be used to convey the message to the participants that Pakistan needed their support to revive international cricket in the country that has remained suspended since 2009 after an attack on the Sri Lankan team in Lahore.

     The PCB chief also said that he would soon be meeting the government officials to negotiate with the Indian counterparts to make the process of obtaining visas for the coming series in India short and simple.

     He said he has asked the government to convince the Indians to issue special visas for the series so that maximum number of Pakistani spectators could go to India to witness the ODIs and T20s between the two countries.

     The series is slated between December 25th and first week of January and the BCCI has scheduled no matches at Mohali despite a request from the PCB to this end. (PTI)