‘Make it Euro-Asia Cup’: Salman Butt takes a dig at Najam Sethi for proposing Asia Cup in England

Former Pakan cricketer Salman Butt has criticised Pakan Cricket Board chairman Najam Sethi for floating the idea of hosting the Asia Cup even in England.
Sethi in an interview with the BBC, said, “The first issue is in principle do you accept the hybrid model? That we play some matches in Pakan, and most other in a neutral venue. The second issue is once you agree on that, whether we play in Sri Lanka, of in Bangladesh or in the UAE or indeed in England, that’s up to the host country to decide. We are the hosts. So we are amenable to discussing that issue as to where the neutral venue will be.”
Responding to the same, Cricket Pakan reported Butt saying, “A neutral venue like this [England] is not viable for Asia Cup, it will not make sense as it will mean that there is not a single venue in Asia where it could be held.”
PCB chief Najam Sethi says the Asia Cup can be staged in a hybrid model, which he also proposes for the World Cup to be hosted in India.
“You can include England in it and make it Euro-Asia Cup. You can also give this suggestion. In the past, Austral-Asia Cup used to take place in which Australia participated. You can also include Ireland and Netherlands in it. It would be a World Cup-like event, as it will have six teams from Asia and four countries from Europe, so it will be a ten-team tournament. It will be a dress rehearsal for World Cup,” the former Pakan opener said.
He also added, “You can come up with as many ideas as possible but you also have to see what is practically possible.”
Meanwhile, in an exclusive interview to The Indian Express last week, Sethi said, “If India now wants to have a neutral venue and accepts the hybrid model, then we’ll use the same hybrid model in the World Cup. Pakan can play its World Cup matches in Dhaka or any other venue to which India agrees, and similarly in the Champions Trophy. So all the other countries can come and play in Pakan but India can play at a neutral venue. So this is a model that goes forward and resolves this political logjam.”

Sethi also reacted to reports that suggested that the BCCI was planning to slot the India-Pakan World Cup game at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad. “When I heard that the Pakan match was to be in Ahmedabad, I smiled and said to myself – ‘this is one way to make sure we don’t come to India’. I mean if you’d said Chennai or Kolkata, it might have made sense,” he said.