Wellington, Nov 14: New Zealand cricket officials today said they will decide by Monday at the latest whether the tour of Pakistan will go ahead this month after threats were made against the players if the series proceeds. Full details of the threat have not been released but New Zealand Cricket (NZC) chief executive Martin Snedden said it was "very direct and it is explicit about the Black Caps in Pakistan and a warning not to go."

The email message "certainly threatened consequences if the team were to ignore the warning".

However, four players and an official who decided not to tour had withdrawn before the threat was received earlier this week. Craig Mcmillan, Scott Styris, Lou Vincent, Ian Butler and team video analyst Zach Hitchcock made themselves unavailable because of trauma from witnessing a fatal bomb blast in Karachi during New Zealand's tour of Pakistan last year.

Heath Mills, manager of New Zealand Players Association, said members of the New Zealand team currently playing in India were "definitely shaken" by the threat, but he could not say if more players would refuse to go to Pakistan.

Snedden said officials were gathering as much information as they could about the threat and "until we've really gone through that process it's a bit difficult to know" if the tour will go ahead. He said a decision would be made by Sunday or Monday. Bureau Report