Indian and Pakistan Cricket Board set to lock horns over ACC dispute in a meet in February

The Indian Cricket Board and the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) will lock horns against each other in Bahrain on February 4 which will pertain to the dispute regarding Jay Shah‘s proclamation over the Asia Cricket Council’s event calendar for 2023 and 2024. The PCB believes that the events were formed unilaterally and solely by the Indian Cricket Board without keeping the Pakistan Cricket Board in the loop. Shah is also the president of the ACC.

The PCB have sought an ACC meeting urgently. Najam Sethi, the PCB chairman, said that the meeting will happen next month. The boards were at loggerheads when Ramiz Raja was the head of the PCB. The issue in question was the venue for the Asia Cup in 2023. The tournament is scheduled to take place in Pakistan but Shah said since India cannot come to Pakistan, it will be moved to a neutral venue. This triggered the outburst between two boards.

We have challenged one of the decisions of the ACC – Najam Sethi

“For some time there hasn’t been any ACC Board meeting and there were a lot of decisions being made and one of them we have challenged,” Sethi said in a press conference. “Now the good news is that we managed to convince them to have their Board meeting and I will be attending it.” Sethi said. When Ramiz was chairman of PCB, he said that Pakistan would not come to play the 2023 ODI World Cup in India, if India do not play the Asia Cup in Pakistan.

Sethi was chosen as the man to run the PCB, and he replaced Ramiz Raja at the helm in a new committee which was formed by Pakistan president Shebaz Sharif. When quipped whether Pakistan will retaliate strongly if India refuse to tour Pakistan for the Asia Cup. Here is what Sethi said: “We have to look at what we can do but we can’t [fight] another case, but I can say that that case wasn’t handled properly and I think we didn’t give a good fight. But eventually, even judges said that if you look through the microscope this case is in favour of Pakistan but if you see this case with a telescope this is going in India’s favour. So in nutshell, with all the nitty-gritty it’s Pakistan’s case, but then their stance was that it’s the [Indian] government which isn’t allowing us [to tour Pakistan].”

India and Pakistan last played a bilateral series in India in 2013, this was a two-T20I and three-match ODI series. India and Pakistan have mostly faced each other in World Events. Cricket stopped for a long time in Pakistan after the deadly terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan players that took place in 2009. Now, cricket is slowly getting back to Pakistan after a long hiatus.