ISLAMABAD – Rising Pakistani cricketer forced to leave cricket and drivevan to earn livings for his family due ban on departmental cricket.
The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) recently came up with an overhauling planof its country’s cricket and one of its moves was to dismantle thedepartmental cricket culture. It met a strong objection as many felt thiswould render many players at the domestic level jobless and create aneconomic hardship for them. That the *criticism*linkwasnot out of place became evident recently when a first-class cricketer –Fazal Subhan – was seen driving a pick-up van in Karachi to meet hissurvival needs.
The story of 31-year-old Fazal came to the fore after a sports journalistposted a video of him. Fazal, who has scored a double century infirst-class cricket and has a strike-rate of 131 above in the T20s and wasconsidered for a national berth, said he has inconsistent employmentnowadays.
“Yes, I drive this [pickup] for bhara (fare). This is seasonal work. Somedays there is a lot of work, and sometimes there is nothing for 10 days,”Fazal told the reporter while sitting behind the wheels of his rentedpickup van.
“I worked so hard to play for Pakistan. During departmental cricket, wewere drawing a salary of Rs 100,000 but since the departments have shutdown we are down to Rs 30,000-35,000, which is not enough to survive,” thecricketer, who played for Habib Bank Limited, said.
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“I am grateful that at least I have this job right now because of the waythings are, who knows if I would even have this tomorrow. We have nochoice; we have to do something for our children.”
Fazal, who last played a domestic game in September 2018 and averagesalmost 33 in *first-class*linkgames,said it is not just him but many other cricketers are going through asimilar ordeal. “There are hundreds of cricketers like me. Some are ridingbikes with Careem, some are driving pickups, and some are stuck incompanies.” – CricTracker
