Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) and Cricket Federation of Uzbekistan (CFU) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to collaborate in several facets of the game as well as to develop cricket and improve cricket ties between the two countries. The PCB will assist in preparing Uzbekistan players on life skills and provide guidance on anti-doping, anti-corruption and code of conduct obligations. Also, the PCB will also explore the opportunity of inviting a team from Uzbekistan to participate in domestic events in Pakistan.

The Cricket Federation of Uzbekistan was founded in December 2019 to develop cricket and the board of directors was formed in 2020. The incumbent CFU's Chairman and CEO Aziz G. Mihliev is determined to popularize the sport in the country.

The Chairman and CEO of the Cricket Federation of Uzbekistan Aziz Mihliev spoke exclusively to Cricwick about his ambitious plans to take cricket in the country to new heights and the progress made thus far in the realm of developing the sport. 

What major headways has your team made since the formation of the cricket federation of Uzbekistan in 2019?

Actually, it requires a lot of perspiration to introduce something new into a society. I should mention here that cricket has never been played in Uzbekistan but only some ex-pats living in Uzbekistan, working at NGOs and embassies, used to play but it was not on a professional level. When I started working on cricket, I knew that I have to do a lot of improvements.

Right after the registration of federation from the government agencies, I could manage to sent two sports background graduates to Punjab Cricket Academy where they learned the basics of cricket and even though this pandemic situation got spread after the level one coaching, we started to write a handbook to highlight main game points as a referral for the new learners. Then, we reached an MoU with the University of Physical Education where we introduced cricket to the university students. Moreover, we started cricket at the school level to attract school children and we are getting positive results. 

How excited are you about the recent signing of MoU with PCB and what do you hope to gain from it?

The Memorandum of Understanding with the Pakistan Cricket Board was really an exciting event. I here send my thanks to all the officers who got involved in realizing this into reality especially to Mr Ehsan Mani who was the former PCB Chairman, who got the idea serious and advised all PCB officials to approve the MoU points. The MoU is all about educating CFU players and staff about cricketing knowledge. It involves sending coaches to train our teams at National Cricket Academy and National High-Performance Centre so this is totally an intellectual help that PCB will deliver to the Cricket Federation of Uzbekistan.

What can you tell us about the cricket infrastructure, the growth of the game at the grassroots level in the country and the presence of clubs and academies?

The infrastructure for the cricket federation is growing. The construction of the grounds is going on and most probably at the end of this year, they will be converted into proper grounds and academies. The government of Uzbekistan is also supporting the cricket federation in terms of government degree which is about to be released soon. The degree is all about helping and supporting the cricket development in the country so, as a result, many government institutions will be involved, starting from secondary education up to higher education so they all will be having classes or courses. 

A department of cricket will be formed at the University of Physical Education. As for the clubs, this is our kick-off from 2019, there are so many clubs that that emerged. I would say some of them are organised by the ex-pats in the country and at this moment I could confirm that we have more than 13 clubs in the country. There are some academies but they are using school grounds to teach and attract school children to cricket. 

How can cricket be popularized further in Uzbekistan?

Cricket in Uzbekistan can be popularized if we keep on increasing our efforts. We are trying to organize different kinds of matches between clubs and academies and between domestic cricket teams. Of course, the minister of tourism and sports in the country, are also highlighting all our activities from their channels and sports journalists are writing about us. Uzbek national team attendance at the international level will definitely give a good kick-off for the population of cricket in our country.

So far starting from 2019, we have established a good relationship with the International Cricket Council (ICC) as well as Asian Cricket Council (ACC). We signed a memorandum of understanding with Cricket Russia and of course as you know the MoU with PCB. I met some officials of the Emirates Cricket Board and they also showed interest in developing cricket in Uzbekistan.

Even the Sharjah Stadium administration offered the Uzbek team to have friendly matches with Emirates Cricket Board teams. And then we could arrange a course of Level 1 for our young coaches so we are trying our best to make progress in the cricketing activities of Uzbekistan.

How did you develop an interest in cricket and are you fond of Pakistan cricket? Any favourite cricketers from Pakistan?

My personal interest in cricket has a long history. During my college years, I got a scholarship to study Economics and Political Science at Bangalore University in the Karnata state of India so, at that time, I stayed at the Muslim Mohalla and there I used to play cricket with our Muslim fellow-mates every day. They started teaching me so I started a little bit of bowling and a little bit of bowling so from that time this came into my spirit. Further, when I was studying in London, I could witness so many professionals players of cricket and even I used to go to the matches and watch them and learn the techniques. In 2019, when I found out that there is no cricket federation in Uzbekistan, I decided to form it.

Pakistan has developed and acquainted the world with many famous cricketers. Personally, I watch matches of Imran Khan, Wasim Akram, Misbah-ul-Haq, Waqar Younis, Zaheer Abbas and Shoaib Akhtar. There are many great cricketers from Pakistan and I can't say one person is my most favourite. 

When can we expect Uzbekistan to send its team to play domestic matches in Pakistan?

We really want to send our players to Pakistan and to play domestic matches. First of all, we need to get associated with ICC and ACC and then hopefully we will have a chance to play with Pakistan as well.