Zimbabwe will be the first team to tour Pakistan since the 2009 terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan team in Lahore, Zimbabwe Cricket chairman Wilson Manase announced in a press conference on Thursday.
Manase also confirmed that the series, scheduled for May, would be confined to Lahore and will include three ODIs and two T20s.
According to the Zimbabwe chief, the decision to tour Pakistan was taken only after security fears of the players and their families were allayed.
“We had a duty to ensure the parents of the players, the players and government through the Sports and Recreation Commission were on board before announcing,” Manase said of the tour.
“We have taken cognisance of all the factors for us to arrive at this decision, so let's not be alarmist about the situation in Pakistan,” he added.
Former Zimbabwe captain Alistair Campbell, who is now the managing director of the country's cricket board, said the tour to Pakistan was the first step in establishing bilateral relations between the two teams.
“We are touring Pak as a measure of establishing bi-lateral relations between us and them,they will also come to Zimbabwe in August,” Campbell said.
Despite the series being played in just one city, the sight of a Test-status team playing again in Pakistan will send out an important message, the PCB said.
Officials from the PCB and Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) met during the World Cup with the African side expressing an interest in touring Pakistan later this year.
“I have met with the chief executive of the Zimbabwe cricket union and we discussed the revival of international cricket in Pakistan. He told me they were interested in a reciprocal series with Zimbabwe wanting to send a team in May,” team manager Naved Akram Cheema told reporters in Adelaide in March.
Since the deadly attack on the Sri Lankan team in Lahore in 2009, only non-Test-playing Kenya and Associates Afghanistan have visited Pakistan.
Pakistan and Zimbabwe last faced off in Zimbabwe two years ago with the with coach Dav Whatmore at the helm.
Whatmore has now taken that position with Zimbabwe and it is being speculated that the 61-year-old may have played a role in convincing ZC about the security situation in Pakistan.
No comments:
Post a Comment