Looking to invite Indian players for PSL - Sethi

Najam Sethi: 'If you [the BCCI] don't want our players to play in your league, okay, but at least let your players play in ours'

Najam Sethi, the head of PCB's executive committee, has said he is looking to invite Indian players to participate in the Pakistan Super League (PSL) in the UAE. The idea, he said, was to try and convince India to go ahead with the scheduled bilateral series in December and, as the next step, discuss Pakistan players returning to the IPL and Indians playing in the inaugural edition of Pakistan's T20 league next February.

India's players do not participate in any of the other T20 leagues apart from the IPL, as the BCCI does not provide them with No Objection Certificates for the same.

Sethi, who had in August ruled out inviting Indian players to the PSL, now told the National: "We are going to try to persuade the Indians to play us in December. If that happens, we will also be talking about a reciprocal arrangement - and I have had preliminary talks with people in Delhi on this - about Pakistani players being allowed to play in IPL and Indian players being allowed to play in PSL.

"If the series takes place in December, the ground will be fertile

. If you don't want our players to play in your league, okay, but at least let your players play in ours. It will be difficult for them to refuse that. There will be pressure from the players. If Indian players do come in, then I think PSL will become the biggest thing in cricket after IPL."

Pakistani players featured in the first edition of the IPL in 2008 but then, following the terror attacks in Mumbai that year, the Indian government suspended all bilateral sporting ties with Pakistan. Since then Pakistan players have remained unsold at the IPL auctions. Recently, the PCB, in a letter to the BCCI, had sought clarity on the mooted bilateral series for December, pointing out that it was part of a memorandum of understanding signed last year by the two boards. But political events in the recent past have cast doubts over such a revival, with BCCI secretary Anurag Thakur himself having scotched the possibility of cricket resuming till political equations had stabilised.

The PCB has already announced that it has over 100 players ready to be part of the PSL drafting process - including big draws like Kevin Pietersen, Shakib Al Hasan and Dwayne Bravo - which is set to take place between November and December. The PSL is scheduled to take place between February 4 and 24, in Dubai and Sharjah, with franchise-based teams from Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar, Quetta and Islamabad competing for prize money of $1 million.