The Pakistan Cricket Board on Monday demanded the match referee and Paiyoft to violate the ICC Code of Conduct during the Asia Cup 2025 match against India and demanded them to be immediately removed from the tournament. Former Zimbabwe’s cricketer 69 -year -old Paiyoft was a match referee in the match between India and Pakistan, in which Indian players did not join hands with the opposing team after the match was over. The PCB has filed a formal complaint against the ICC against Paiyoft. However, the tournament is not the ICC but the Asian Cricket Council.
At the same time, PCB chief Mohsin Naqvi wrote on X that, the PCB has filed a complaint against the match referee against the MCC rules and violation of the ICC code of conduct. The PCB has demanded immediate removal of the match referee from the Asia Cup. Naqvi is also the Chairman of ACC at this time. Pakistan had earlier raised the issue before the Asian Cricket Council and described the behavior of Indian players as contrary to sportsmanship. PCB earlier said in a statement that team manager Naveed Cheema has strongly opposed the behavior of Indian players who did not join hands after the match. This is the contrast to sportsmanship and sports. As a protest, we did not send our captain to the ceremony after the match.
The matter has now caught up, which started with a boom of coins in Group A match when Suryakumar Yadav and Pakistan captain Salman Ali Aga did not join each other. The PCB has claimed that the Referee Picroft had asked the two captains not to follow the tradition of joining hands before the match. Indian captain Suryakumar and Pakistan’s Salman Ali Aga did not even look at each other. The two teams may collide twice in the Asia Cup and India can repeat the policy of not joining hands.
Suryakumar had earlier said that it was his way to show solidarity with the families of the victims of the Pahalgam terror attack.