As New Zealand made a last-minute withdrawal from their limited-overs tour of Pakistan on Friday, Pakistan Cricket Board’s newly-appointed chairman Ramiz Raja lashed out at the tourists for their attitude.
In a highly dramatic turn of events, New Zealand Cricket opted out of the series on the day of their opening game on tour citing a “security alert” from their government back home.
But with the details of the alert not shared with the PCB in a decision taken on their own, Ramiz said it is “frustrating” for his regime, Pakistan cricket and its fans to have a visiting team depart like this and warned the NZC of taking the matter up with International Cricket Council.
Ramiz’s sentiments were echoed by the top-cream of Pakistan cricketers, including contemporary all-format skipper and batting giant, Babar Azam, who called the New Zealand decision “extremely disappointing”.
Babar, as did his players on their respective Twitter handles, also backed his nation’s security agencies and their arrangements for the series in Pakistan.
NZC had mentioned in their press release that they are abandoning the tour for security reasons after an alert was received from the New Zealand government and their own security advisors present in Pakistan for the trip.
More specifically, the decision to not continue with the tour was taken “following an escalation” in the estimation of threat levels by the government before the same was communicated with the NZC and the team management and players that toured Pakistan.
Player safety being of utmost importance behind the decision, NZC CEO David White still, offered words of consolation to Ramiz & co, recognising that it will be a “blow for the PCB”.
But those words offer no respite for PCB, which stated that the New Zealand decision is completely “unilateral” and has been taken despite “foolproof” security arrangements made by PCB and Pakistan government.
New Zealand were going to play three ODIs in Rawalpindi on September 17, 19 and 21 before moving across to Lahore for five T20Is on September 25, 26, 29, October 1 and 3, respectively. This was to be Kiwis’ first visit to Pakistan for a bilateral series since 2003.
Initially, when both the teams didn’t come out to take the field in Rawalpindi on Friday and the toss was delayed, it was feared that the cause of such an unexpected pause on proceedings is Covid.
There were speculations that members of one or both teams’ camps have contracted the contagious virus, and consequently, some health safety precautions are being put in place.
But few would have thought cricket in Pakistan is in for such a cruel reminder of the last decade’s dark days where the national side hosted no Test matches and played only a handful of infrequent limited-overs fixtures in their country.
While PCB has been working extensively over the last five-six years on the security issue along with the Pakistan government, New Zealand’s decision threatens to pave the way for another such period of exile. England, West Indies and Australia are due to visit Pakistan in the coming months, but the fate of those series now hangs in the balance.
