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India-Pakistan Cricket Cannot Have Conditional Ban, Says Gautam Gambhir

Written by Vipin Darwade

The India vs Pakistan match is a much-awaited contest and Wednesday will be a big day for cricket fans from both countries as the two teams will hit the cricket field after quite some time. The political tensions between the two neighbours has deprived, as both teams last met on a cricket field in the ICC Champions Trophy 2017 final where Men in Blue suffered a 180-run loss against Sarfraz Ahmed’s men. Gautam Gambhir, who is usually not the one to mince his words, has now said that the cricket bodies should not put a conditional ban on Indo-Pak matches where the teams do not play bi-lateral series but clash against each other in Asia Cup and global events.

“If you want to ban someone from playing, you should ban them from playing every form of cricket, whether it’s Asia Cup or ICC events. You can’t have conditional bans in sports. You can’t say we won’t play bilateral series but we can’t do anything about ICC events and Asia Cup. If you want to play Pakistan in Asia Cup, why don’t you play bilateral series as well? If you don’t want to play Pakistan in bilateral series, then don’t play them in Asia Cup and in ICC events either. That is a decision that the BCCI and the Government needs to take,” the veteran left-handed batsman told.

 

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Vipin Darwade