Suryakumar Yadav, India’s captain, has spoken out on the continuing controversy surrounding Pakistan’s threat to boycott their scheduled ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026 group match against India, stating unequivocally that the Indian team is still committed to attending and participating in the headline battle.
“The (Indian) team’s mindset hasn’t been deterred despite whatever we’ve heard around what’s happening off the field and all those things,” Suryakumar Yadav said ahead of the pre-tournament captains’ news conference in Mumbai on Thursday.
“I think mindset is pretty clear. We have not said ‘no’ to playing the match. It came from the other side. ICC has given the official fixtures. BCCI and the government has decided on a neutral venue along with ICC. Our flight is booked for Colombo. So we are going for sure,” Suryakumar said.
In a statement that has already made headlines, the 35-year-old confirmed that his team is completely prepared for the showdown, regardless of how the boycott plays out.
“The team discussion is that we are playing first on February 7, then we will go there,” he added.
India will open their world cup campaign against the United States on February 7 and then proceed to Sri Lanka to play the high profile match. Suryakumar noted that interaction in the team has been straight and preparation-based.
As the India-pakistan match is a highly anticipated match and now marred by a boycott threat, the utterances made by the Men in Blue captain show a clear indication of the team not wanting to get distracted by the boycott threat and instead play the game as scheduled, and the ultimate decision can be left to the governing bodies and the players themselves.
India vs Pakistan: One-sided affair in multinational tournaments
There is a lot at stake but it’s been very lopsided as far as India-Pakistan is concerned, especially in the ICC T20 World Cups. The bitter rivals have played out a total of eight encounters at the WC with the Men in Blue winning on seven occasions and Pakistan just once. Their lone victory came in the 2021 edition, when Babar Azam’s side beat India by 10 wickets.
