Batsman Saleem Elahi has been dropped from the Sharjah-bound Pakistan team as the tournament organisers insisted that they would allow a squad of only 15 players for the Sharjah Cup one-day international competition.

"We are sad for Saleem Elahi because we sincerely wanted to retain him in the team as we thought he was improving and would learn more under the wings of someone like Javed Miandad," a spokesman for the selectors told reporters in Karachi.

"But despite our several requests to the organisers, the 16th player was not allowed because of inflexible tournament rules," he said.

Pakistan's selectors, in an effort to revamp the team after its poor performance in the recent World Cup, dropped eight senior players and selected a 16-member team for Sharjah consisting mainly of young and promising cricketers.

The team will now proceed to Sharjah without Elahi, who was also a member of the World Cup side in South Africa.

The triangular series in Sharjah is facing rough weather following South Africa's decision to pull out in the wake of the American invasion of Iraq. But the organisers are trying to save the tournament by making it a quadrangular and including Kenya and Zimbabwe.