Afridi vows to overcome odds at World T20 trophy presentation

KARACHI – ICC Chief Executive Haroon Lorgat, who is visiting Pakistan for the first time after attack on Sri Lanka team at Lahore in March 2009, said here Thursday that he wanted the final of the World Twenty20 to be played between reigning champions Pakistan and hosts West Indies.
He was addressing a media briefing held here at local hotel on Thursday during the presentation of the ICC World T20 trophy in the presence of PCB chairman Ijaz Butt and Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi.
Before the question-answer session which followed opening statements from the three persons, they posed with the white crystal trophy. The competition will begin in the Caribbean on April 30.
Lorgat said it was fantastic to visit the reigning champions Pakistan who deservedly won the event in England last year after narrowly losing the final of the inaugural event in South Africa in 2007. He was confident that the action in the Caribbean will maintain, if not surpass, the successes of those previous two tournaments.
With just 15 days to go, he said he was looking forward to another fast and furious tournament with 42 men’s and women’s matches over 17 days in true nation-versus-nation action.
This year’s event, Lorgat said, would have a new and exciting Afghanistan team which qualified for the world event first time along side Ireland whom they defeated in the qualifying round.
Until recently Afghanistan was playing in lower grades of the ICC competition, the country had taken huge step forward. Afghanistan was an amazing good news for cricket and their entry at world level was especially relevant to Pakistan as many of those in the squad learnt and played the game in or around Peshawar, he said.
He said he personally would like to see Pakistan playing host West Indies in the final.
Responding to a number of queries on lack of International cricket in Pakistan, Haroon said it was unfortunate that due to reasons beyond the control of cricket administrators, international cricket was not available to Pakistan.
He said he very well understand the feelings in Pakistan and recalled that his own country South Africa also suffered the same situation when international cricket was out of bound there due to political reasons. Lorgat did not mention the reason for lack of international cricket in South Africa but it was due to the apartheid policies of the racist South African government that denied them international cricket.