Hyderabad: Former Pakistan cricketers Javed Miandad and Inzamam-ul-Haq have expressed their disappointment over the Indian cricket team’s inability to travel to Pakistan to take part in the ICC Champions Trophy 2025.
Pakistan, the hosts of the ICC Champions Trophy 2025, have provisionally scheduled all India’s matches in Lahore, given the proximity the city has to the Indian border.
However, the Indian government did not give permission to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to send the cricket team to the neighbouring country.
The BCCI had informed the ICC about their inability to travel and the ICC, in an official email, has informed the host country about the same. The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) is now in talks with their government about how to go ahead with the tournament.
Reportedly, the Pakistan government has asked the board to stop playing against India in any global event until India agrees to tour Pakistan.
While there are talks of hosting the tournament on a hybrid model, on the same lines of how the PCB hosted the 2023 Asia Cup with India playing all their matches in Sri Lanka, the PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi has dismissed the thought in the past.
However, former Pakistan cricketers have expressed their disappointment over the latest updates. While Miandad opined that Pakistan will prosper without playing against India, Inzamam said India are depriving world cricket a big occasion by choosing not to travel to Pakistan.
Miandad opined that a lot depends on the coffers of the ICC in scheduling India vs Pakistan matches. “It is a joke that this is happening. Even if we don’t play India at all, Pakistan cricket will not only survive but prosper as well as we have shown in the past. I would like to see how the ICC events earn money when there are no Pakistan and India matches,” Mianded was quoted by various news agencies and PTI.
Inzamam said there is no threat to any Indian player who visits Pakistan. “Indian players will not face any threat in Pakistan and will get the best hospitality here. They are depriving world cricket of a big occasion,” he stated.
While India have not travelled to Pakistan since 2008, Pakistan have played in India in the 2011 and 2023 ODI World Cups and the 2016 T20 World Cup.
