ICC was worried into awarding Pakistan Champions Trophy presenting rights

KARACHI: The 2025 Champions Trophy holding rights being awarded to Pakistan came as a result of burden on the International Cricket Council, Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Ramiz Raja has demanded.

New Zealand’s independent decision to shortly abort their Pakistan tour and England’s last-minute pull-out from their scheduled visit in September last year triggered criticism from the then newly-appointed Ramiz.

The ICC announced Pakistan as the hosts for the 2025 Champions Trophy and New Zealand and England decided for tours late in 2022 and 2023 following talks between their boards and PCB.

Ramiz said during a press conference at the National Stadium here on Wednesday, “The ICC was under pressure when New Zealand and England cancelled their tours”.

“And when the pressure was created then we got the Champions Trophy, which means the ICC recognized that Pakistan was treated wrongly.”

Last month, New Zealand Cricket allegedly agreed to pay the PCB an undisclosed amount as recompence for abandoning the series and the Black Caps are scheduled to visit Pakistan for two Tests in December this year and five One-day Internationals and as many T20s in April 2023.

England will visit for seven T20s in September while Pakistan have also been invited by the NZC for a tri-nation T20 tournament involving Bangladesh in October.

Ramiz said the high number of matches for the team’s scheduled tours were also a part of the compensation. The PCB chief, though, said the board enjoyed good relationships with the England and Wales Cricket Board and NZC, as well as the ICC.

“Our relations with the ICC are good but from a commercial point of view, we feel we deserve more and I’m going raise this issue in July and I’ll ask them to increase our return.”