Talking about some crazy news cycles we've heard, well,
medical reports are short Sharebox, they're not attending
the 2009 World Cup. We've had some insane press
releases from the boxing and cricket management, but this is
an absolute banger of a news boxing team.
Every single individual fined ₹50,00,000 almost 18,000 USD on
arrival to Pakistan for a poor performance in the T20 World Cup
in 2026 at the time of recording.
I have also fined Bashar 50,00,000 PKR for just being a
spoiled sport on this podcast and actually dragging me out to
doing this episode. I did not want to do this
episode. Bashar was like you can find me
5050 lakhs and we'll call it even.
And here we are. Bashar, you heard the news.
What the hell is happening in Pakistan?
Again on a Sunday. Why?
Why?
The PCB outdoes itself again. There's been no real history of
of such a president where a cricket board has fined its
players for such an amount after losing a World Cup.
Now I get it, there was a lot of hype of Pakistan team going into
the World Cup playing all their matches in Sri Lanka with a spin
heavy attack and underperforming.
But a 50,00,000 PKR fine. You know what's crazy?
There's no player right now in the category A central contract
for the PCB. So no player even makes
50,00,000 PKR per month. Yeah.
What is the category B makes 30? I think they make around. 4040,
so that's like almost like a month and a half of worth of
their salary going away. I just think this is absolutely
ridiculous. The people who should be usually
or mostly the people who get the brunt end blunt end of a World
Cup campaign like this are the players, even though it should
be the management, it should be the chief selection team.
It should be every anybody else except for the players who in
the right mind, convinced Mike Hessen to select Barbara Razzam
and make him play at #4 That person should be fired
immediately. And maybe they are.
Maybe they're resigned. Maybe their name is Alimdar.
I'm not sure. If you're following, but Azad
Ali is allegedly one of the selectors right now in the panel
and he's on TV with Imad, the Seam and Swathamir and.
No, he's not one of the chief selectors.
It's only four. I think he mentioned that he's
part of the selection consultancy panel.
OK, but the the. Or he was previously.
The chief selectors on paper are Aleem Dhar, Assafiq, Akib, Javed
is like the chief sector I believe.
And then Hassan Chima is the analyst.
Analyst So that's that's the vibe in the chief selection
committee and they went with Barbara.
Yeah. As it early as come out saying
that Mike Heston and Sanwanaka have a really big say in what
team they want and they're getting the team that they want.
But that basically deflects all the responsibility from sectors.
Like why do you even have selectors as the coach and
captain are picking the team? I I'm all for like the captain
and coach to having powers, but then why have a selection panel
even you know? But you need to put them in the
section panel. That's probably the way to make
it, you know, more resounding. A chief selector definitely
needs to be given the reins to select the team that is on
paper, the most accountable. But at the same time, why don't
slap ₹50,00,000 fines to them and not the players?
Like these guys didn't even land in Lahore yet and in in the air,
they're like, oh, by the way, by the time you land in Lahore, you
guys will be all -50,00,000. Now, I'm assuming that this
black PKR fine is not something that they have to give, but that
will be probably taken away from the central contract payments.
That's probably how it works. But the fact that we're
discussing this is insane. What's crazier is that they
actually imposed these fines after Pakistan lost to India.
That's that's what the reporter saying the players knew.
The players were informed that they'd be put a 50 live PKR fine
because of their performances and I think there was a clause
where if they made the semis that this fine would have been
undone. But imagine the players then
playing the game against Namibia, New Zealand, England,
Sri Lanka with this looming fine in the back of their head that
they. So every time that Barbara
Rossum goes to bat, he knows that he doesn't perform, that he
has to give 50,00,000 VKR. Like that is such an insane
thing. This is giving Zakhashov in the
23 ODI World Cup lives Yeah, where Pakistan is at the World
Cup. And he is releasing a press
statement that this team is picked by Barbara Azam and
selector. And if things go South, we will
keep these guys accountable mid World Cup.
Yeah, now this news came out post World Cup.
But still like the the fact that this is happening in the middle
of the World Cup where you you need to make sure that your
players are mentally ready and fit and not under any sort of
pressure to go out there and perform with the best of their
abilities. And they're fighting these PCB
fines and internal drama. When does it stop?
It never stops. I think that you're you're right
about the Zechao of throwback. It felt like a whiplash to a lot
of people who were there for that era.
And again, like, when is when are these people going to take
responsibility for their own actions?
And I'll just dump everything on the players.
Like honestly, we've talked about how Nakli Sava is not the
good man to probably lead this PCB chart.
Chair, a country like Pakistan, most of that we should not be
doing 2 jobs. Yeah, Interior Ministry of
Pakistan, which is like. In heat right now and.
PCB chairman of Pakistan. Again.
Two really important jobs. Beaten by one person.
Yeah, but. Different levels of importance,
one literally depends on the safety and security of of your
countrymen and the other is like box on cricket which is also
very important for the moral and soft power.
Whatever whatever. But at the same time, you also
don't want them that person to be divided in that regard.
And yet here we are. So this was like one of those
news where I I stood there and I was like, I could not believe
this was real. This came out a couple of days
ago. I chose to not I chose to not
believe it because, you know, journalists on Twitter, nobody
knows what's going on. But at the same time that it was
broken by ESPN, Freakinfo. And I was like, oh, OK, now this
is like in the big leagues, this is out there this month.
Somebody was talking about it, who was talking about it.
And I was like, this is got to be one of the worst and weirdest
things that has come out in a very long time.
How will this help boxing cricket in any way?
Will that will these guys suddenly become better
cricketers because they now have a looming fine in their heads?
This is giving what the Bangladesh cricket selector, I
believe, said about the Bangladesh cricket players was
that we should take all their money away from them.
They haven't performed. But that's not why you paid
these people out in the first place.
Like if a, if a, if a enterprise hires you and pays you and tells
you to do this one job and you execute that job, but it's not
successful, they won't take the money that you've paid you back.
That's not how employees work. And so this is just a
ridiculous, ridiculous thing that I don't even, I don't even
know why we're giving this airtime.
Honestly. This is like when we do stuff
like this and when people talk about it in such, in such a high
regard as as if it is breaking news, you just give this sort of
bullshit legitimacy. And you know, I've, I've seen it
everywhere, like every single person is wanting to talk about
this. And I'm like, stop.
Like this is, yeah, this is bad. My stand on this is that your
players and the performances are a direct correlation to a
system. So what you're seeing now in
Siam and you is basically the outcome of Pakistan's entire
domestic system. Like Siam and you for example is
has come through the pathways system, the PCB like he's
playing under Sixteens, under Nineteens, domestic Pakistan,
Shaheen's PSL and the Pakistan team.
So if Siam is not flopping here, that's less than Siam and more
on the system that's been designed by the PCB and there.
Is no system to get him out of the rut.
There is no system to get Babar Azam out of the situation that
he finds himself in. And so how are we supposed to
keep finding the players for the same issues that have been
occurring in this the same system for decades?
And also, there's news that Aleem Dar has allegedly
resigned. Yes.
That's that's the main news, I think I.
Think so Aleem Dar when and the. Way that the news was broken was
the first resignation this year. Bam bro.
Who else is going to resign? More to follow with more to
follow. So Aleem Dar, when he retired
from umpiring, he said that he wants to focus more on his
Academy and and charity stuff. And then he joins the PCB as
sector. It's a.
Charitable job to make sure that the Pakistani players are the
right team was selected and yet he was not able to.
I'm just thinking of things from a perspective of Farhan.
Farhan is. OK.
Has finished the World Cup as the highest run scorer of any
edition of any World Cup. He has scored two hundreds, the
most hundreds in a single edition of the World Cup.
He has scored the second most sixes.
And he comes out of his flight to Pakistan and gets a
notification that PCB has imposed A50 live PKR fine on
him. Like what is going through for
Han's head now? Should play for other country.
What else? This is insane.
How is? This for Hans fault Like what?
Why is the entire team being fired not?
Only that like they're coming from back from Sri Lanka during
these geopolitical tensions where like the entire Gulf
airports are shut down. They're probably finding like a
direct flight or a charter flight.
But everybody's a bit stressed out.
Everybody's on on a little bit of an edge only to have this
also be on top of their agenda. I think like you said this news
was already broken or told the camp camp guys after the India
game and so post India game all those performances are on the
back of you are you guys are going to get fined $18,000 if
you don't make it through to the end.
How are? How is anybody supposed to
perform in that sort of environment?
We heard a story in the 23 ODI World Cup where the days leading
up to the Indian match, the entire management was trying to
let the guys know, hey, it's just a match, don't take it to
pressure. Go out there, play your game,
express yourselves. Box on is already scheduled to
lose, so might as well go out there and pose yourself, play
attacking cricket, you know, just express yourself.
And then a day before the indoors Pakistan match, the PCB
chairman Zakhashov comes to the meeting and he says you guys
need to win this match for our sanctity, for the country.
And immediately all that lead up towards the game where the
management was trying to just calm these guys down.
It's been reversed thanks to Zakhashov.
Yeah, so like, we're trying, even if, let's say, Honey Palek
or Mike Hasson are trying to get these guys to just simmer down,
calm down. But when they finish a game like
India and they see the sort of backlash on social media and by
the PCB, it's never just a game anymore.
Yeah, I mean, this has been going on for a while now, I
think to the 2017 eighteen and then all these all these pundits
on TV, quote UN quote, pundits on TV are just like finding a
field day. I can't believe that this is the
type of stuff that the PCB does that brings both and I in
alignment like this is horrible and I can't believe I have to
say that like this is what the PCB will make you do.
It will find the worst person on TV and make you agree with them.
Thank you PCB. So PCB is more like an
organization where the players are their employees.
And I don't even know if there's any sort of clause in their
contracts where the PCB can impose such fines.
But it's just going to have a horrible effect on the players
morals on their performances in the future.
Because if they're still thinking about, hey, if I don't
score runs, take wickets, they might be they're fine imposed by
the PCB. And if I feel like PKR for all
cricketers, by the way, a lot of whom were involved and still at
major losses in the Ponzi scheme by that apparel company.
If I feel like PKR at this moment is not good for them.
Yeah, I just think it's it's the, I don't even know if it's
like a financial hit or not, but the aesthetics, the optics don't
look good. And again, we have the PCB who
is a cricket board that does not make the best decisions, makes
another decision that is counter counterproductive,
counterintuitive. I just, I don't, I don't know,
like PCB has gotten a lot of money in the past few months.
A lot. Of money through the PSL.
Deals and what? 2 new teams added.
There's been a huge. Team sold again.
There's. Been a huge broadcast deal with
with Waddy technology, so the PCBS right now, they're drowning
in cash. And then why would you need an
extra 50K or 50? What is it million from your
players? The.
Question is what is PCB? All the cash, you know, we were
at the Diamond Cricket Stadium in Islamabad to a couple of
years ago with this noble joiner team and me and you saw the
facilities at that ground that is a first class ground.
That is the home of Imad Dasim and the Islamabad club team.
And the chairs were dusty. The dressing room did not look
like a dressing room. I would not want to dress
anything there. Yeah, the washroom barely had
water flowing. Maybe that maybe that's why they
need this money the. Grass was burnt, the Nets were,
it seemed like maybe honey moment.
They're back in the day. Probably so.
Unless you invest back into domestic and the facilities and
coaches and gyms and trainers, we will never see the Pakistan
team at the national level perform well because our players
are a byproduct of the system. So if the system is not strong
and not producing good talent, we're going to have these exits
in the World Cups. Yeah, and this has been sort of
the the story of of the past few editions of the ICC events going
back to 2022 and moving forward from there.
It's just been like a tough, tough outing for for all of
them. Man, I just hope this is like
this news will probably, I assume this news will probably
be cancelled out and the PCB will come out that hey, this was
not the case. And maybe we thought about it,
maybe we didn't. But this we're not being this is
not being implemented. I think this is the way forward.
Just to make face some kind of face like this is really, really
embarrassing for everyone involved, I think.
The PCB is also kind of mad where before the 23 ODI World
Cup, the Pakistan team under Barbara Rossman's cap and see
renegotiated some really big contracts.
So players got for the first time a share of the ICC revenue,
which never happened before. They got incredible salary price
hikes. And so the PCB is like, you guys
are demanding all these things, but where's the performances,
right? You got to back the performances
up to get those incentives. But right now with the past
what, 4 ICC events? Three ICC events, you haven't
made semi finals. But is that again I'm hearing
what you're saying but is that in their players claws that it
is a performance based incentive?
Otherwise you will you will get paid more if your performance is
good and you will also be fined if your performance is not good.
I I need some transparency on this.
If that's the case, then OK, well, that makes sense.
It's a bad clause, but it's in the it's in the contract.
I just as I understand right now, there was no, no such thing
in place. And this is completely left
field and a lot of these players and people, including us fans
are just like, what is this? That's makes no sense, so.
Pakistan makes money when they go play IC events, they get
matches, they get bonuses for winning matches, for finishing
or going to the next round or finishing in certain places in
the tournament. So I think that there the
payouts from this World Cup will be deducted with this fine.
Yeah, it makes sense. But for some of these players,
this is a big amount. Like for some modmers, odd and
off, who are just starting their careers, these are pretty hefty
amounts, yeah. I it's not even their fault.
That's the crazy thing. It's, it's the chief selector,
selection committee, management, coach, captain, probably.
Those are the names that I'm looking at.
Those are the people that I'm looking at to actually put blame
on the Zakim driver who was on record and said that I will take
full ownership of this team that I'm I'm letting go into the
World Cup. And so where is he now?
Nobody found, but Joshi Sports is here.
Joshi Sports is in Canada. They are Canada's home of
cricket and they've given us an exclusive code of BB 15 or 15%
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promised to us by them. 100% thank you very much for tuning
in to this very short episode. We just wanted to cover some of
this ground and wanted to talk about what it actually means to
be in the PCB bubble and what actually means to be a boxing
cricket player at this moment. Anything and everything can
happen to you all at once. Right now we don't even know who
the boxing ODI team captain is and I know it's shiny, not
really, but cannot be the case that that continues.
Boxing has an ODI series in less than a week and things are up
and afloat. Call.
Back call back.