Mickey Arthur says India-Pakistan match looked more like a BCCI event than ICC game

Pakistan lost to India a crucial match of the ongoing ICC World Cup 2023 by a big margin in Ahmedabad on Saturday. 

Batting first, Pakistan set a 192-run target for India. In response, India scored the required number of runs in the 31st over at the loss of just three wickets. 

Although India did not make public the number of people in the crowd in Ahmedabad, it was between 115,000 to 120,000 and there were only three Pakistanis present in the crowd and those too were Pakistani Americans. 

The absence of Pakistanis in the stands was the consequence of the Indian government’s refusal to give visas to the Pakistani cricket fans for the tournament. The situation wasn’t too different for the Pakistani media persons wishing to travel to India. Until Friday, only three out of Pakistan’s 60 journalists – from an original application long list of 355 – had been provided visas, that too after lengthy delays.

And this resentment was also reflected in the words of Pakistan cricket team director Mickey Arthur, who said he didn’t want to use this as an excuse for the loss, but questioned the one-sided nature of the fan base. 

“Look, I’d be lying if I said it did [not affect us],” Arthur said this at Saturday’s post-match conference when asked about the partisan crowd. “It didn’t seem like an ICC event to be brutally honest. It seemed like a bilateral series; it seemed like a BCCI event. I didn’t hear Dil Dil Pakistan coming through the microphones too often tonight.”

Arthur was asked if such a situation should be allowed at global events. He said, “Look, I don’t think I can comment on that just yet,” he said. “I don’t want to get fined.”

Pakistan head coach Grant Bradburn had similar sentiments about Saturday’s match between Pakistan and India. “Naturally that [a sea of blue] was going to be the case. We are really sad that our supporters aren’t here,” he said. “They would love be here and I am sure Indian cricket fans would love our supporters here as well,” he said.

“It was certainly unusual in that way, no familiar music for us today. So it did not feel like a World Cup game, honestly. We didn’t expect anything else. [But] we love the occasion and we are disappointed that we did not do justice to the occasion or justice to our many fans at home and globally.”