Pakistan’s request to swap the venues of their ODI World Cup 2023 matches against Australia and Afghanistan has reportedly been turned down by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and the global governing body ICC.
The Pakistan Cricket Board were hopeful of having their venues for two of their matches during the 2023 ODI World Cup in India swapped with each other. According to the draft schedule, Babar Azam’s men are slated to lock horns with Australia in Bengaluru on 20 October, and they take on Afghanistan in Chennai on 23 October.
The PCB wanted the venues for both games to be swapped so that Pakistan would get to play Australia in Chennai and Afghanistan in Bengaluru. However, their request has been turned down by the BCCI and ICC.
According to a report in Cricbuzz, a joint meeting was recently held between the boards, they outright denied the same.
According to a report in ESPNcricinfo, an internal note from the PCB read, “Australia in Bengaluru and Afghanistan in Chennai are the two which we should look to get changed as much as possible.
“Ideally, we can switch these around. Australia in Chennai and Afghanistan in Bengaluru would make us obvious favourites in both matches,” read the note further.
During multi-nation events such as the World Cup, the venues where teams will play is a prerogative of the host nation, and any changes to the same must but approved by ICC.
Earlier in 2016, Pakistan’s T20 World Cup match in India was shifted from Dharamsala to Kolkata due to security reasons, but since the latest demand from PCB is not related to security, it was denied by the BCCI and ICC.
It was further reported that Pakistan also wanted a change in their warm-up games, the PCB wanted to square off against one of the big-wigs such as South Africa, New Zealand or Australia, although they’re currently slated to play their warm-up match against Afghanistan.
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