Overview:
The Men in Blue have been dominating Pakistan for a long time and registered three consecutive victories over the arch-rivals in the Asia Cup 2025.
Sanjay Manjrekar believes that Pakistan pulling out of the ICC T20 World Cup 2026 match against India will not impact the global tournament. The Pakistani government has told the national cricket team to boycott the contest on February 15 in Colombo. However, the apex body of international cricket is not happy and has told the PCB to rethink its stance. A lot of meetings are expected in the next few days to resolve the matter, but even if the deadlock doesn’t end, Manjrekar said it shouldn’t make any difference, simply because the competition level between the two arch rivals has gone down.
“Not a big deal if the match doesn’t happen. The game never lives up to the expectations now and both team are not in the same league anymore. Earlier, Pakistan was a strong team in the 90s but not anymore. There is no issue if the match is not played,” he said.
Manjrekar mentioned that the focus should be on India’s matches with other top teams. The Men in Blue have been dominating Pakistan for a long time and registered three consecutive victories over the arch-rivals in the Asia Cup 2025.
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“You still have Australia, England, New Zealand and South Africa in the tournament. The matches against them are important and India need to beat them. When India beat Pakistan now, it is almost like beating the minnows. Pakistan cricket has gone down. There is a lot of difference between the two teams,” he added.
“For me, India vs Pakistan is no deal. It is unfortunate if the match doesn’t take place as you don’t to see a team getting a walkover but it is not going to bring the value of the tournament down because of the presence of other strong teams.”