HYDERABAD
\nAs the glitz and glamour of the HBL Pakistan Super League returns for an eighth edition from next week with hi-octane action across four venues, Niaz Stadium\u2019s agonising wait for revival of national and international cricket continues.
\nOnce an important centre for hosting international and domestic cricket as the only stadium in Sindh after Karachi\u2019s National Stadium, Niaz Stadium now lies in ruins. Quetta\u2019s Bugti Stadium hosted a PSL exhibition match on Sunday between Quetta Gladiators and Peshawar Zalmi and while there has been talk of taking the PSL to Peshawar, the Niaz Stadium doesn\u2019t even enter the conversation.
\nIt\u2019s fallen off the radar despite Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah claiming in 2018 that the Niaz Stadium would host PSL matches in the following year.
\nFor now, citizens of Hyderabad have been left reminiscing about the glorious times when the venue hosted top international matches and Pakistan\u2019s star players were seen in action.
\nIt was here in 1983 that Javed Miandad scored an unbeaten 280 against India. \u201cAs ninth grade student, I wanted to see the action,\u201d Akram Shahid, now a senior photographer, told private media. \u201cI managed to get some scoreboard work with local contractual scorers. While busy in scoring behind [old] scoreboard, we were anxiously waiting for Miandad\u2019s 300 but skipper Imran Khan declared the innings.\u201d
\nA year before that, Jalaluddin had taken the first hat-trick in One-day International cricket in a match against Australia at the Niaz Stadium.
\nIn 1987, it was the venue for the opening match of the World Cup between Pakistan and Sri Lanka and a decade on, it hosted a ODI between Pakistan and India.
\nThat game, won convincingly by Pakistan, is also remembered for events leading to it with then-Pakistan Cricket Board chief Majid Khan expressing dismay over a grassless patch in the outfield at the Eid Gah end. \u201cI\u2019ll hang you upside down if it gets seen on television,\u201d Majid would tell venue official Hafeez Mughal, whose team would treat that in time for the game.
\nBy the turn of the millennium, though, the stadium\u2019s condition went from bad to worse before then-district nazim Kanwar Naveed Jamil handed over stadium to PCB under a memorandum of understanding for administrative purpose and infrastructural development including new outfield, structures\u2019 reconstruction.
\nAfter taking over in July 2007, the PCB organised a one-dayer between Pakistan and Zimbabwe in January 2008 but the Niaz Stadium was largely maintained for first-class matches and it gave an opportunity to cricket fans to see former skipper Mohammad Hafeez, Mohammad Asif, Salman Butt, Mohammad Amir, Kamran Akmal and Umar Akmal in action for their respective departments.
\nWith the PCB not honouring the terms, the Municipal Committee Qasimabad \u2014 the ground\u2019s custodians \u2014 revoked the MoU and took control of it again in April 2018 and that step saw cricket leave the Niaz Stadium.
\n\u201cIt [the committee] doesn\u2019t have professional expertise to maintain the ground,\u201d former Hyderabad Region\u2019s cricket association president Mir Suleman Talpur told. \u201cOnly the PCB can do it and it must do it now.\u201d
\nExisting conditions of venue merit massive development and Sindh Chief Secretary Dr Mohammad Sohail Rajput had spoken to former PCB chief Ramiz Raja about revival of cricket in the city. But then came change of command in the board.
\nFor now, Niaz Stadium has been relegated to hosting local tournaments and even tape-ball matches. It faces an unending decay with the outfield in a bad shape, general enclosures crumbling and the conditions of the dressing rooms and the pavilion deplorable.
\n\u201cWhen the National Stadium, Peshawar\u2019s Arbab Niaz Stadium, Multan or Bugti Stadiums can be reconstructed and renovated why can\u2019t they do the same with the Niaz Stadium,\u201d wonders Mir Suleman. He, however, believes things might change if the PCB or the Sindh government takes the initiative. But till then, the Niaz Stadium \u2014 where Pakistan has never lost a Test or ODI \u2014 will have to wait.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
HYDERABAD As the glitz and glamour of the HBL Pakistan Super League returns for an eighth edition from next week with hi-octane action across four venues, Niaz Stadium\u2019s agonising wait for revival of national and international cricket continues. Once an important centre for hosting international and domestic cricket as the only stadium in Sindh after […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":313158,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-313140","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports"},"yoast_head":"\n