Watson, Ingram, Bell, others agree to visit Pakistan for PSL3

KARACHI (Monitoring Desk): A large number of foreign cricketers, including Australia’s Shane Watson and England’s Ian Bell have expressed willingness to visit Pakistan to play matches of PSL3, if picked by franchises from the players draft tomorrow.

Sources privy to the matter told Geo.tv that most of the 291 foreign players included in the players draft for the PSL3 have said yes to visiting Pakistan for PSL. Some of the players have expressed conditional consent.

“The platinum players giving unconditional consent to visit Pakistan include Australia’s Shane Watson, South Africa’s Colin Ingram, West Indian Dwayne Bravo, Australian John Hastings and South Africa’s JP Duminy,” the source said.

“Thisara Perera, Carlos Braithwaite, Angelo Metthews, Jason Holder and Mitchell McClenaghan have also expressed conditional consent to visit Pakistan,” the source added.

Pakistan born South African cricketer Imran Tahir and Afghanistan’s Rashid Khan are also among the players who have agreed to visit Pakistan for PSL matches while Chris Lynn, Evin Lewis and Alex Hales have yet to confirm their availability.

Other players, according to sources, expressed willingness to visit Pakistan include Tim Bresnan, Richard Levi, Ian Bell, James Vince, Wayne Parnell, Luke Ronchi, Colin Munro, Darren Bravo, Kyle Abbott, Tymal Mills, Marlon Samuels and Albie Morkel.

From the Gold category, James Franklin, Grant Elliot, Dawin Malan, Ben Duckett and Morne van Wyke are among the players who have agreed to visit Pakistan.

A source in PSL secretariat, on condition of anonymity, told geo.tv that more than 85 percent of foreign players have agreed to visit Pakistan which guarantees success of PSL.

“Although we are still four months away from PSL, at the moment we have consent from a large number of players to play the PSL matches in Pakistan,” said the PSL source while hoping that security situation in the country improves further.

The source further added that most of the players retained by the PSL franchises have also responded positively to the request of playing in Pakistan.

Pakistan hosted the final of PSL between Peshawar Zalmi and Quetta Gladiators earlier this year. Top players like Chris Jordan, Darren Sammy, Marlon Samuels were in Lahore for the final which opened the doors for further cricket in the country and led to a visit by World XI for a three-match series and by Sri Lanka for a T20I.

However, platinum players Mitchell Johnson Chriss Gayle and Eoin Morgan are not yet convinced to visit Pakistan for PSL matches.

The six franchises will pick players in platinum, diamond, gold, silver and emerging categories in players draft to be held on Sunday in Lahore.