Pakistan cricket plunges into crisis
It’s just not cricket.
Ducking for cover as bullets replaced bouncers… players evacuated in a military helicopter that lands right next to a 22-yard pitch… the same strip at Lahore’s Gaddafi Stadium that saw Thilan Samaraweera score a double century the previous evening.
Samaraweera was hit on his leg during an audacious attack by armed militants on a convoy taking his team to the venue, an attack that left six cricketers injured and more than half-a-dozen Pakistani security personnel killed.
The world of cricket will never be the same again.
More worrying is the fate of Pakistani cricket. Tours to Pakistan were already a trickle with teams like Australia refusing to travel.
The matches against Sri Lanka came after more than a year of near pariah status. And even this tour was hastily arranged after India pulled out post-26/11.
After months of shadow boxing and pulled punches, the ICC had to suspend international cricket in Pakistan.
Cricket in South Asia: critically injured?
This is not the first time cricket or cricketers were targeted in the subcontinent, especially Pakistan.
India’s 1982-83 tour of Pakistan was disrupted after rioting marred the last Test in Karachi. Who can forget the sight of scared cricketers scampering to the pavilion as an angry mob invaded the pitch at the National Stadium.
In May 2002, a car bomb exploded in Karachi in front of the hotel where the New Zealand team was staying, killing 13 people, including 11 French navy experts. New Zealand called off the tour within hours of the attack.
As ironic as it may sound, New Zealand cricket has had quite a few close calls in the subcontinent.
Despite the threat to players’ security, something which has led to postponement or cancellations of many tours, the subcontinent has always presented a united front which many will say was instrumental in the centre of gravity of world cricket shifting from England to South Asia.
There was always the fear of violence, the threat was clear and present, but what unfolded outside the Gaddafi Stadium at Lahore took the fear and threat to a new realm. Is cricket in the continent critically injured?
Spare a thought for the Lankan cricketers. They are trained to face the best of bowling, not bullets and grenades.
Sree
excellent point
The underlying objective of this shwoing by sri lanka in Pak is to stand in solidarity with a fellow south asian country in need of support.
They should replace the injured and travel back to Lahore soon to complete the ongoing series.Thats what India did a few years ago, to go play in Sri Lanka, when non asians refused to travel to srilanka to play in the name of security or lack there of it.
being an indian,i can’t thank God enough that india cancelled its tour of Pakistan.God knows what would have happened to them.Maybe the incident was top show how deep terrorism has reached into the core of Pakistan.
All the same i also feel sorry for the Pakistani public and people…Pakistan has always enjoyed and has been good at cricket.Now without any tours,PCB will find it difficult to maintain pakistani cricket at its current standards.