With Asia Cup uncertain, PCB's revenue could take massive hit

Karachi: With the future of this year's Asia Cup T20 tournament mired in uncertainty, the Pakistan Cricket Board is bracing for a severe hit to its revenue.

The Pakistan Cricket Board is expecting to earn an estimated 8.8 billion rupees this year from its share of the revenue from the International Cricket Council (ICC) and the Asian Cricket Council (ACC).

According to details coming from a reliable Board source, the PCB has outlined an amount of USD 25.9 million (approximately 7.7 billion rupees) during this fiscal year as its share from the ICC.

The Board is hoping to earn another 1.16 billion rupees from the Asia Cup and 7.77 million rupees through other international cricket events.

"The revenues from these two major sources (ICC and Asia Cup) is very important for the financial health of Pakistan cricket," one well-informed insider said.

He said the uncertainty over the schedule and venue for the Asia Cup has increased as PCB Chairman Mohsin Naqvi did not travel to Singapore for the ICC meetings last weekend.

Naqvi, who is also the federal interior minister, instead took part in the AGM virtually.

According to the insider, PCB CEO Sumair Ahmed, who had gone for the ICC meeting, "didn't get positive responses" from either the BCCI or the boards of Sri Lanka, and Afghanistan over attending the ACC meeting called on July 24 in Dhaka to finalise the Asia Cup arrangements.

"The PCB met with plenty of resistance to the ACC scheduling the meeting in Dhaka. India, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Oman and few other associate member boards were adamant about not travelling to Dhaka," one insider added.

He said the discussions on the sidelines of the ICC meeting don't augur well for the Asia Cup being held on schedule in September as the BCCI is not willing to send its representative to Dhaka.

The ACC is currently headed by Naqvi.

Originally India was scheduled to host the Asia Cup in September but due to the existing stand-off with Pakistan after the Pahalgam terror attack, the chances of the regional event being moved to UAE are high.

Sumair was also sent to Dubai earlier this year to attend the Champions Trophy final ceremony but due to some "miscommunication", he was not a part of the officials who were on stage for the presentations.

Interestingly in the expected revenue given in the budget for the fiscal year, the PCB has included 2.5 billion rupees as the estimated revenue from the next edition of the Pakistan Super League.

The PCB's total budget for the fiscal year is around 18.8 billion rupees.