India–Pakistan cricket rivalry
Updated: Wikipedia source
The India–Pakistan cricket rivalry is one of the most intense sports rivalries in the world. Matches between the teams are considered some of the biggest in the world and are among the most-viewed in all of sports. The two teams have played a total of 211 times, with Pakistan winning 88 matches and India winning 80. In Tests and ODIs, Pakistan has been victorious in more games than India, while India has won more games in T20Is. In ICC World Cups, the two sides have met head to head in 16 matches, with India winning 15 of them. Both India and Pakistan have won the ICC Cricket World Cup, the ICC T20 World Cup, as well as other prestigious tournaments. In fact, India has won seven ICC trophies, while Pakistan has won three ICC trophies. The tense relations between the two nations, resulting from bitter diplomatic relations and conflict that originated during the Partition of British India into India and Pakistan in 1947, the Indo-Pakistani Wars, and the Kashmir conflict, laid the foundations for the emergence of a fierce sporting rivalry between the two nations who had shared a common cricketing heritage. The two sides first played in 1952, when Pakistan toured India. Since then numerous Test series and, later, One Day International (ODI) series have been played, although a number of planned tours by both sides have been cancelled or aborted due to political factors. No cricket was played between the two countries from 1962 to 1977 due to two major wars in 1965 and 1971, and the 1999 Kargil War and the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks also interrupted cricketing ties between the two nations. In the 1980s and 1990s, the growth of large expatriate populations from both countries across the world led to neutral venues to host bilateral and multilateral ODI series featuring the two teams. In addition, there has always been high demand for tickets for the matches between the two in global ICC competitions, with over 800,000 ticket applications made for their meeting in the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup; the television transmission of the match was watched by 273 million viewers. Players from both teams routinely face extreme pressure to win and are threatened by extreme reactions in defeat. Extreme fan reactions to defeats in key matches have been recorded, with a limited degree of hooliganism. At the same time, India–Pakistan matches have also offered opportunities for cricket diplomacy as a means to improve relations between the two countries, allowing heads of state and cricket followers from either country to travel to the other to watch the matches. The last full bilateral tour between the teams was Pakistan's tour of India in 2007, where both Test and ODI series were played. However, following the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai, orchestrated by Pakistan based terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba, India suspended the planned 2009 series and all future engagements with Pakistan. The attack eventually led to detrimental consequences for both nations, in diplomacy and cricket. Since then, as both teams only meet in ICC or ACC tournaments and with India emerging as the winner on most occasions, the rivalry in cricketing sense has faded to an extent, prompting Indian Captain Suryakumar Yadav to say it isn't a rivalry anymore.