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England backs down, will tour Pak

England will, on schedule, tour Pakistan this winter, and then host them the following summer.

This was confirmed by England and Wales Cricket Board chairman Lord McLaurin in London.

The statement comes as an about turn from the ECB's earlier stance, voiced by McLaurin a week ago, that the tour to Pakistan would be in jeopardy if the Pakistan Cricket Board picked players who had been named, in both the Justice Quayyum report and the famous Salim Malik tapes made secretly by News of the World reporters, as being involved in match-fixing.

McLaurin indicated that he expected the Pak board to drop the tainted players. "If the board does not take action, the ICC can the step in and ask the board to rethink and if even that doesn't work, then the ICC can take the final decision," McLaurin said at the time, adding, "In my view, this sort of action is necessary if we are to cut out the cancer from the game."

A week later, those strong words have been replaced by gentle cooing. "Our relationship with the PCB remains entirely cordial," the ECB chief said on Monday, while announcing that the England tour of Pakistan would go through sans pre-conditions.

One reason could be that Malcolm Gray, who took over as ICC chairman from Jagmohan Dalmiya on Monday, anounced that other than passing over a copy of Justice Qayyum's report to the ICC's own Code of Conduct commission, no further action would be taken at this point in time.

This statement takes the wind out of McLaurin's sails. With the ICC itself announcing that there would be no action, it would not have been tenable for the ECB to fly in the face of that statement.

Another reason could be economic. The ECB coffers, not at the best of times the kind to excite envy in a Croesus, is in even poorer shape following the added burden of placing 14 England players on permanent contract.

In a bid to raise money, McLaurin had even suggested a series of India-Pakistan one dayers to be played in England, in order to tap the enormous public interest teams from these two nations evoke, as evidenced during the 1999 World Cup. India turned down the suggestion -- and quite right too, given the dichotomy of McLaurin suggesting on the one hand that masala matches should be eradicated in order to bring match-fixing and betting to a halt, and on the other hand asking India and Pakistan to play a series of masala matches so England's cricket treasury could get a badly-needed refill.

With India backing out of the proposed tournament, the last thing the ECB needs is to alienate Pakistan which, like India, is a top draw in UK stadia.

"We are fully committed to touring Pakistan this winter, and we look forward to entertaining them here next summer," is how McLaurin is putting it.