‘We were punished for 10 years… Our cricket went backwards’

The ICC Champions Trophy will mark the return of big-ticket cricket to Pakan after nearly three decades. The last mega, multi-team event hosted Pakan was the 1996 World Cup, which Pakan co-hosted with Sri Lanka and India.
Many cricketing nations avoided touring Pakan after the 2009 terror attack where the Sri Lankan cricket team had come under attack from terrors.
“The events of 2009 feel like a bad dream,” former Pakan captain Inzamam Ul Haq said recently while talking about the terror attack on Sri Lanka. “We were punished for 10 years. Our cricket went backwards.”
Story continues below this ad

The Pakan national team hosted its ‘home’ games in the United Arab Emirates before teams started to reluctantly travel to Pakan from 2018.
What had happened in 2009 terror attack
The attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team happened on March 3, 2009 while the team was playing a Test match in Lahore. The incident happened while the Sri Lankan team bus was making its way to the venue for the third day of the Test. The team bus was ambushed around 9am (local time) just outside the Gaddafi Stadium 12 gunmen. The terrors were heavily armed, wielding assault rifles, grenades and rocket launchers.
The terror attack had caused the deaths of six policemen and a driver escorting match officials. Several others were injured, including seven Sri Lanka players and coaching staff members of the team.
The tool could have been much higher. A rocket fired at the team bus skimmed over the roof of the vehicle while a grenade that was rolled under the bus did not detonate. Kumar Sangakkara, in his Spirit of Cricket address, spoke of a bullet hitting the seat where his head had been a second earlier.Story continues below this ad
In fact, Sri Lanka had replaced India for the tour after the Indians had pulled out after the Mumbai attacks in November 2008.