Dale Steyn, Chris Lynn and Jason Roy headline the initial 28-player Platinum Pool ahead of the 2019 draft of the Pakistan Super League. Other notable players registered include England’s Moeen Ali, Alex Hales, Chris Jordan, Adil Rashid and Liam Plunkett and just-retired South African cricketers Hashim Amla and JP Duminy. Star batsman AB de Villiers, who represented Lahore Qalandars in the previous season, has opted out citing workload concerns.
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While player participation in PSL 2020 is subject to their selection in the draft, the registration of these 28 players is noteworthy given the fifth season of the T20 tournament is scheduled to be played in entirety at Pakistan, across four venues – Lahore, Karachi, Multan and Rawalpindi. With Pakistan slowly welcoming regular international cricket after hosting the PSL final in 2017, four and eight matches of the 2018 and 2019 seasons respectively, the conduct of the forthcoming edition of the tournament, it is hoped, will serve to deliver an emphatic message of safety and security to the wider international cricket fraternity.
Foreign Players in Platinum Pool
England: Jason Roy, Moeen Ali, Adil Rashid, Alex Hales, Chris Jordan, Liam Plunkett, Harry Gurney
South Africa: Hashim Amla, JP Duminy, Dale Steyn, Colin Ingram, Rilee Rossouw, Imran Tahir
West Indies: Carlos Brathwaite, Dwayne Bravo, Evin Lewis, Sunil Narine, Kieron Pollard
Australia: Chris Lynn, Dan Christian, Ben Cutting
Afghanistan: Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Rashid Khan, Mohammad Nabi
Sri Lanka: Angelo Mathews, Thisara Perera
New Zealand: Colin Munro
Nepal: Sandeep Lamichhane
England’s Dawid Malan leads a strong field of 59 foreign international cricketers who have registered to date in Diamond Category for HBL Pakistan Super League 2020. The registration window for the foreign players is still open and closes on 21 November following which an updated list will be released.
Daren Sammy, the darling of HBL PSL, is amongst 12 West Indies players who have registered in the Diamond Category that also includes Johnson Charles, Shai Hope, Alzarri Josphe, Keemo Paul and Marlon Samuels.
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Other prominent names in the preliminary list include Bangladesh’s Mahmudullah (world’s fourth-ranked all-rounder) and Mustafizur Rahman (world’s 32nd-ranked bowler), Roelof van der Merwe of Netherlands (world’s 24th-ranked all-rounder) and Sri Lanka’s Niroshan Dickwella (world’s 72nd-ranked batsman) and Isuru Udana (world’s 56th-ranked bowler).
Dasun Shanaka, who led Sri Lanka to 3-0 win over Pakistan last month, is also in the preliminary Diamond Category.
Foreign Players in Diamond Pool
England: Tom Banton, Ian Bell, Ravi Bopara, Tim Bresnan, Pat Brown, Tom Kohler-Cadmore, Mason Crane, Liam Dawson, Joe Denly, Laurie Evans, Lewis Gregory, Liam Livingstone, Dawid Malan, Tymal Mills, Craig Overton, Matt Parkinson, Phil Salt, James Vince, Luke Wright
West Indies: Fabian Allen, Johnson Charles, Rahkeem Cornwall, Shai Hope, Alzarri Joseph, Brandon King, Keemo Paul, Sherfane Rutherford, Daren Sammy, Marlon Samuels, Oshane Thomas, Kesrick Williams
South Africa: Kyle Abbott, Cameron Delport, Marchant de Lange, Rassie van der Dussen, Robbie Frylinck, Simon Harmer, Heino Kuhn, Duanne Olivier, Dane Vilas, Hardus Viljoen, David Wiese
Sri Lanka: Niroshan Dickwella, Danushka Gunathilaka, Kusal Mendis, Dasun Shanaka, Isuru Udana
Bangladesh: Mahmudullah Riyad, Mohammad Saifuddin, Mustafizur Rahman, Tamim Iqbal
Australia: Fawad Ahmed, Chris Green, Ben Laughlin
Afghanistan: Najeebullah Zadran, Qais Ahmad
Netherlands: Roelof van der Merwe
New Zealand: Luke Ronchi
At the draft, each PSL team will be required to assemble a roster of 16 players within a purse of USD 1.1 million (down from USD 1.38 million). The squad can include five foreign players and 11 local cricketers. Teams can also pick up two additional supplementary players, one of whom can be foreign. Each team can, however, pick only three players from the elite Platinum Pool. Six more players (three each) will have to be picked from the Diamond and Gold Pools and then rounded off with five picks from the Silver and two more from the Emerging Players Pool.
The PCB will announce additions to the list by or before 21 November, it will continue to share to date Gold, Silver and Emerging lists this week.
The six teams – Multan Sultans, Karachi Kings, Islamabad United, Lahore Qalandars, Quetta Gladiators and Peshawar Zalmi – can retain up to eight players from their existing squad. The trading window, should the franchises wish to swap the players, will be open until December 1. The other players will be released to the draft pool and be available to be picked up.
