Yousuf rejects taking money from PCB to quit ICL

Karachi, Feb.15 (ANI): Prolific Pakistan middle-order batsman Muhammad Yousuf has categorically denied reports about him taking 10 million rupees from the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to quit the Indian Cricket League (ICL).

Addressing a press conference here, Yousuf refuted taking any money from the PCB to quit the ICL.

He admitted that he had received 12 million rupees for signing a central contract with the Board, out of which six million rupees was awarded to him for being the highest run getter in a calendar year.

"If anybody could prove that I had taken money from the PCB to leave ICL, I would return the money," The Nation quoted Yousuf, as saying.

Referring to the ban imposed on Pakistani players who sided with the ICL, he said players were being ill-treated by the PCB, and urged the patron of the Board, President Asif Ali Zardari to intervene and look into the events that had unjustifiably sidelined the players including him from Pakistan cricket.

Yousuf said he joined the ICL after the PCB kept him out of the World Twenty20 Cup squad.

"Exclusion from the World T20 Cup was unjustified. Who could judge that I was not good enough for the Twenty20 cricket when I had not been given an opportunity to play," he said.

When enquired about leaving for India for participating in the ICL, without informing the PCB, when he was included in Pakistan's national team for Abu Dhabi series, he said: "I left for India before the team was announced."

He argued that the contract with the ICL had clauses which allowed him to appear for national duty whenever required.

"There was clause in the contract that the ICL would release me whenever Pakistan needed my services. I got the impression that the PCB did not need me, so I went to ICL," Yousuf concluded. (ANI)