No word yet on whereabouts of cricketers

Five Indian players from a cricket clinic in Karnataka sent for training to the Australian Cricket Academy (ACC) have been reported missing with no word on their whereabouts, a clinic official said in Mangalore on Thursday.

The cricketers sent by city-based Karavali Cricket Academy left here for Adelaide on March 24 via Mumbai by Singapore Airlines and a fax message was received that they had reached there, the Academy Convenor P V Mohan told PTI. But when ACC's Head Coach Wayne Phillips, who had sent the fax, went to the airport to pick them up, the players, who were native of Thrissur in Kerala, were missing, he said.

Mohan said he had not received any communication either from the missing players, or from their parents or from the club they represented. The names of the players in the age group of 22 to 26 were given as Sebi D E, Baiju M A, M O Shiju, Jophey and V J Thomas.

A foreign agency report from Adelaide quoted Phillips as saying that he could not find the players at the airport and had not seen them since. He said he could not say what had become of the players. "That's not upto me to comment on... we have passed it over to the Department of Immigration and the Department of Foreign Affairs. We're obviously concerned about their safety, so it was appropriate to go to those departments."

Mohan said the five cricketers approached him during February this year to consider their request to go for the annual trial at ACA for skills training and he wrote to Phillips who in turn gave his nod. Out of five players, four had VISA for one month from March 24 and another for three months, he said. Mohan said this was the first time that such an incident had happened and added that a team from the Academy had successfully toured Sri Lanka in 1999 and another was visiting Britain during May.

Karnataka Chief Minister S M Krishna tonight said he would take up with the Australian authorities the disappearance of five cricket players from the state who had gone to Australia for training. "We will try to get in touch with the Australian High Commission in Delhi. We will try to find out what it is all about", Krishna told reporters.

Karnataka Sports Minister, S S Mallikarjuna, who was with Krishna, said the five cricketers have nothing to do with the Karnataka State Cricket Association, adding, they were sent on a private visit by the Mangalore based Karavali Cricket Academy. "It is still in the enquiry stage", he said.