Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi took to Twitter on Monday evening to highlight irony between Pakistan’s cricket legacy and Sri Lankan players’ refusal to visit Pakistan for a tour. specific irony he picked up on involved Imran Khan himself being a former Cricketer - and a successful one at that - but failing to inspire sufficient confidence in a neighbouring country to visit his own, while parallelly 'ranting and raving' against India. This comes after Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) on Monday anunced list of players who will t be taking part in Pakistan Tour which will commence from September 27. Chairman of National Selection Panel, Mr. Asantha De Mel, said that  players were given freedom to decide on ir participation for forthcoming matches in Pakistan. 

Read: Sachin Tendulkar hails Steve Smith's 'ORGANISED MINDSET' in Tests

Why Sri Lankan players don’t want to visit Pakistan 

In March 2009, a visiting Sri Lankan team’s bus was attacked by terrorists at Lahore following which top test teams have stopped touring Pakistan. This happened when Sri Lankan team was in middle of a test match, visiting  Gaddafi stadium. After this incident, Test international test matches have been played in Pakistan, with Pak national side often having to 'play host' at neutral venues.

Read: Sri Lanka Cricket: 10 players opt out of Pak tour over security fears

However, Zimbabwe, Kenya, ICC World Eleven, Sri Lanka and West Indies have come for short visits to Lahore and Karachi to play limited over games. A security delegation from SLC visited Pakistan to look at security arrangements for forthcoming ODIs and T20 matches. y visited  grounds and hotels where teams would stay in Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad besides meeting board, police and security officials. 

Read: PCB faces a setback as senior Sri Lankan players refuse to tour Pakistan

SLC's decision

After due investigation of place, former Sri Lanka Air Force Commander, Marshal Air Roshan Goonetileke, who is Chief Security Advisor of SLC, briefed players about security situation in Pakistan and security arrangements PCB plans on implementing during Sri Lanka team’s tour of Pakistan. Following meeting with players, National Selectors, selected a T20I and ODI squad to tour Pakistan. players who have boycotted  Pakistan series include Niroshan Dickwella, Kusal Janith Perera, Dhananjaya De Silva, Thisara Perera, Akila Dhananjaya, Lasith Malinga, Angelo Maws, Suranga Lakmal, Dinesh Chandimal, and Dimuth Karunaratne. Kusal Mendis was absent for selection process due to an injury he had suffered during New Zealand Series.  

Read: Sri Lanka to Appeal Singapore to extradite ex-central bank chief