India touring Pakistan for 2025 Champions Trophy would be challenging issue to work through: ICC Chairman

It was only in a recent while when ICC came up with the list of host venues for major upcoming events. And through the same announcement, it came to the fore that Pakistan would be hosting the Champions Trophy 2025. It is known to all that Pakistan and India do not lock horns with each other in bilateral series due to geopolitical tension between them.

In the same line of events, ICC chairman Greg Barclay stated that India touring Pakistan in 2025 would be really challenging in the end, but ICC really cannot do much in the matter. Pakistan and India haven’t visited each other for a long time now.

I just hope cricket can be a force to help improve relationships between India and Pakistan, says ICC chairman

“Yeah, we know it’s a particularly challenging issue to work through, but from my point of view, I cannot control geopolitical forces. I just hope cricket can be a force to help improve relationships between countries. That is the one great thing sport can do is help people and nations come together. If it can help in contributing to that, then it is fantastic,” said Barclay while speaking to reporters.

Talking further about the bilateral series, ICC CEO Geoff Allardice stated that the charm won’t go away. He added that as per the rotation policy and bio bubble fatigue management, different players will be seen stepping at different times and this will keep the momentum of the bilateral games.

“I do not think the charm of bilateral cricket will go away. You will see a different range of players, in particular at the moment where people are moving in and out of bubbles, you will see players rotated a little more than normal time but judging by the reaction to the series that recently concluded in India, it does not look like that the appeal of bilateral cricket has diminished much at all,” said Allardice.

Pakistan and India recently locked horns in the league game of the T20 World Cup of 2021 where men in green thrashed the Virat Kohli led side by 10 wickets.