India will only play against Pakistan in India: BCCI president

Manohar says BCCI have their own reasons to not play Pakistan in the UAE

The fate of Pakistan-India bilateral series still hangs in a limbo as Board of Cricket Control in India Chief Shshank Manohar said on Thursday India will only play against Pakistan in their own country.

“I have made it clear to him [Shahryar Khan] that team India can play against Pakistan only in India. We have our own reasons to decline playing in UAE. We cannot reveal the reason though. As of now, we only want them to come to India for this bilateral series,” Manhoar said, according to Asian Age.



Claiming he is "fed up with the statements" of his counterpart Shahryar Khan, the BCCI president said, “Every day he is coming out with different statements.”

On Thursday, the chief of PCB’s executive committee Najam Sethi said, “The Pakistani government position is that the PCB cannot play in India without the government’s permission which has not been given. The government raised security and safety issues for the PCB regarding playing in India.”



Sethi questioned why India cannot play in UAE. “I don’t know why India doesn’t want to play in the UAE. It recently played IPL matches there. We are waiting for a fresh proposal from the BCCI. But our position is clear. We are not going to play in India,” he added.

Further, BCCI secretary Anurag Thakur confirmed that the decision regarding the Pakistan series will be taken in the coming days. “Wait for a couple of more days,” said Thakur.

Thakur refused to comment on any possibility of playing in the Emirates, and said it’s up to the boards involved in the bilateral series to decide the venue of the series.



“For any international event organised by ICC or ACC, it’s up to them to decide which is going to be the venue. For a bilateral series it’s up to the two nations to decide where they are comfortable,” explained Thakur.

 The article originally appeared on asianage.com