Asia Cup-2010: India Vs Pakistan Cricket History

Cricket claims to be the world’s 2^nd most popular sport in the world after Soccer. Although debatable, but when it comes to South Asia, Cricket is by far the most popular sport here.

South Asia is the power house of Cricket. And the most powerful cricket board, BCCI, the Indian Cricket Board, is also a part of South Asia. Over the years, South Asia has contributed a lot towards the game of Cricket. First, India and Pakistan produced legendary cricket stars like Sunil Gavaskar, Zaheer Abbas, Sarfaraz Nawaz, Kapil Dev, Imran Khan, Majid Khan…and the list goes on and on.

Then, Cricket spread its roots to the neighboring countries of these two arch-rivals. Sri Lanka started showing some great talent. And now Bangladesh is emerging as the 4^th strongest team of Asia.

But the Cricket in South Asia is mainly dominated by India and Pakistan. And when these 2 teams (India vs Pakistan) are up against each other, you are bound to get excited. No matter what the event is, no matter what the Cricket Ranking of each of these teams, no matter which era it is, when there is match featuring India vs Pakistan, the whole Cricket world expects a fascinating clash.

The history of India vs Pakistan Cricket is very volatile. More often than not, the two teams avoided playing Cricket against each other due to the several political tensions.

India Vs Pakistan History

Since 1978, there have been a total 118 ODI Cricket matches featuring India vs Pakistan. Out of which

Pakistan Cricket Team managed to win 69 games; India remained victorious on 45 occasions; while 4 encounters did not produce any results. Last time the world saw a Pakistan vs India clash in ODIs was in 2009 during the ICC Champions Trophy match in Centurion, South Africa. Pakistan Cricket team won that match by 54 runs.

And now on Saturday June 19, there is another Pakistan vs India ODI match in Sri Lanka where the Asia Cup-2010 is in progress. Pakistan Cricket team has lost its first match to Sri Lanka in a close contest by 16 runs. On the other hand, the Indian Cricket team has won its first match quite convincingly against the weakest team in the tournament, Bangladesh, by 6 wickets.

India Vs Pakistan: Who is Favorite This Time

So, who is favorite for this Pakistan vs India clash? As mentioned above, in an India-Pakistan cricket match, it’s always difficult to predict the winner. All we expect for sure is competitive performances from both the teams. However, if you look at both the teams, the Indian Cricket Team looks a better side on paper. With plenty of experienced players, India appears to be somewhat stronger.

On the other hand, Pakistan Cricket team is not in the best of shapes. Although they played well against Sri Lanka in the opener, but it was the skipper Shahid Afridi’s heroic innings of 109 that took the match so close. Other than Shahid Afridi, only Abdul Razzak played with responsibility. And in the bowling department, Shoaib Akhter was the only impressive bowler with 3 wickets. Therefore, Pakistan has to play as a team. All the players need to perform, if they want to win this Asia Cup-2010.

So, to me, Team India has a slight edge over Pakistan in this upcoming India v/s Pakistan clash. However, the only thing we can be sure of is a close match and some brilliant performances from both sides.

Your Turn Now: What do you think – Who will Win this India v/s Pakistan Match? India or Pakistan? Who is Your Favorite and why?  Who can win Asia Cup-2010? Or Anything Else…Tell in your COMMENTS!