Abu Dhabi: It will be a historic moment for Pakistan as Sri Lanka return to Lahore after eight years — a venue which holds painful memories of the terror attack on their team bus.
On March 3, 2009 a dozen heavily armed terrorists left at least nine players and officials, including Sri Lankan vice-captain Kumar Sangakkara injured and six people dead, becoming the darkest chapter in the sporting history of Pakistan. An episode that took cricket away from the shores of Pakistan.
The roars will be back at the deserted Gaddafi Stadium and hopefully, will reverberate enough to send the message across to the cricketing world that Pakistan deserves another opportunity.
The green brigade has been forced to play cricket in their adopted country UAE since 2009. The isolation has deprived the cricket-crazy country any opportunity of hosting an international cricket at home.
It’s all the more painful to see that talents like the Mohammad Amirs and the Babar Azams, who have come and set the world stage alight with their prowess, are yet to play an international match in their own backyards.
With the geopolitical situation always remaining volatile, the Pakistan Cricket Board’s (PCB) effort to convince the member nations had fallen flat over the years.
In May 2015, after a lot of persuasion and financial incentives, the Zimbabwe team did tour Pakistan for a limited overs series. Undoubtedly, it attracted large crowds but it could not win the confidence of the cricketing world. That series wasn’t incident-free either, as a suicide bomber blew himself about 1.5 kilometres from the venue at the outer security cordon of the stadium but it did not affect the tour.
PCB took another baby step towards bringing cricket back to their nation by introducing Pakistan Super League in 2016. Though the first edition was entirely held in the UAE, the following year PCB managed to host the final in Lahore.
Big names like Chris Gayle, Kieron Pollard, Kevin Pietersen, Tymal Mills, Luke Wright, Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene, Samuel Badree and Shane Watson didn’t travel. Some of them even turned down additional bonuses between $10,000 and $50,000.
Despite that, it was a huge shot in the arm of PCB considering that several other top players like West Indians Darren Sammy, Marlon Samuels and England’s Chris Jordan figured in the contest and in the end gave their thumps up.
However, it was ICC’s decision to hand them the World XI vs Pakistan three match T20I series last month which set the ball very much rolling. The World XI squad, led by South Africa’s Faf du Plessis didn’t have the superstars of this era — Virat Kohli, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Gayle, Ben Stokes, David Warner or AB de Villiers in their midst. The successful hosting of the event did add a lot of weight and credibility but the question remains if Pakistan, as a nation, is ready to host international matches? The prime reason being the unprecedented security blanket that Pakistan has thrown in to make sure nothing untoward happens during these confidence building efforts. It will be like playing a match in a fortress.
Sunday’s game, the third and final Twenty20 in Lahore will see tens of thousands of army, rangers, special forces and police personnel deployed. Five layers of security cover and the PCB’s own bullet proof buses will carry the teams to the stadium. It’s akin to Presidential security, and the Sri Lanka team will be there for less than 24 hours. Led by stand-in captain Thisara Perera, with a depleted team sans six of their regular players who pulled out due to security concerns, the team will go straight to the stadium from the airport and back after the match.
The contest clearly gives as impression that you are playing cricket in a war zone and endorses what former cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan had commented when PCB hosted the PSL in similar bid.
Khan had termed the security measures as ‘madness’ then, saying: “Under such monumental security arrangements, matches can even be held in Iraq and Syria.”
By roping in Sri Lanka, Pakistan has managed to garner a lot of brownie points but that doesn’t guarantee a visit by any top team in the near future. All that PCB and ICC will be looking for is that cricketing nations take a firm note of these tours and build enough confidence to increase the chances of another top team visiting Pakistan.
