Our unique selling point is that we can host events at a short notice: ECB COO Subhan Ahmed |

DUBAI: It doesn’t have a big cricket culture, but the United Arab Emirates, since the last few years, is turning out to be a hub of major cricketing events.
Due to covid, UAE staged the Indian Premier League in 2020 and 2021 (second half), the T20 World Cup in 2021. Due to geopolitical issues, it staged the Asia Cup in 2018 and 2022. Last year in October, it staged the Women’s T20 World Cup after it was moved from a disturbed Bangladesh, and it is currently hosting India’s matches in the 2025 Champions Trophy.
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With India and Pakistan refusing to travel to each other’s countries to play even in multi-nation tournaments, it could end up staging the Asia Cup (in the T20 format) in September this year too.
Certainly, it can’t be easy to stage international matches at the last minute, but the Emirates Cricket Board has achieved a sort of an expertise in it.
“We’ve only come to know from the media that we are hosting the Asia Cup. There’s been no official confirmation to us in this regard. Our unique selling point (USP) is that we can host events at a short notice. In the last five years, we’ve hosted the Indian Premier League, Pakistan Super League, the Asia Cup, (Women’s T20) World Cup all at very short notice. So, we are prepared. We are (always) in a state of readiness, anytime we are given an opportunity to host an event,” ECB COO Subhan Ahmed told reporters at the Dubai International Stadium on Sunday, during the India versus New Zealand match.
“It’s not very difficult for us because we’ve been hosting international matches for a long time now. It’s definitely challenging as a host, when the other teams are there (in Pakistan) and only one team is here, but we dealt with the situation as if we are organizing this tournament independently, and we’ve organized it very smoothly so far. It’s a PCB and the ICC’s decision to host the matches here. We’ve 100% autonomy in operational decisions,” Ahmed explained.
The ECB COO said that his board has started to manage the workload of the pitches at the DICS immediately after being told that they will host India’s matches in the 2025 Champions Trophy, even as it was hosting ILT20.
“The moment we learnt that we will host India’s matches in the Champions Trophy, we started preparing for this even as the ILT20 was on. We complied with all the ICC requirements, giving the required rest to those pitches which we were going to use for the Champions Trophy, and so far, the pitches have played out really well,” Ahmed revealed.
Amidst hosting numerous international cricket tournaments, UAE is also working towards developing its own cricketers — a couple of net bowlers-left-arm pacers Awais Ahmed, who almost broke the toe of Indian captain Rohit Sharma in practice, and Wasim Akram, impressed Rohit big time.

Asked about the low turnout during India’s first match of the Champions Trophy, against Bangladesh here, Ahmed said that the number of spectators at DICS had increased gradually.
“The crowds have picked up gradually. It (for the India vs Bangladesh match) was more than 60% (turnout). Some countries are facing challenges to travel, which could be a factor. However, the turnout for the subsequent matches has been very good. The ticket sales were around 95% (of the capacity). Maybe, some people didn’t turn up after buying the tickets! Today, there’s around a 93% turnout, and it will increase as the day wears on,” he said.
Pointing out to the healthy crowd for the India versus New Zealand match on Sunday, Ahmed said, “It’s the second day of Ramadan, and the stadium is almost full. Pricing of the tickets is not an issue.”
Elaborating on how UAE manages to maintain its grounds and pitches, despite the extreme weather conditions in this part of the world, Ahmed said, “It’s a bit technical, but twice a year, we plant a certain grass. The equipment and the manpower that we have, ensures that the outfield and pitches remain perfect. And then we also do a lot of workload management of the pitches, in accordance with the amount of cricket we have scheduled in Dubai through the year.”

Amidst staging numerous international matches, the ECB is also working hard to develop UAE cricket.
“In the last four-five years, we have worked very hard on this (developing UAE’s cricket). We’ve organized a lot of domestic events (at the behest of national head coach Lalchand Rajput, UAE has started organizing a domestic red-ball tournament for the first time). The ILT20 has a development tournament, which provides an opportunity and talent to the local, talented players. We’ve earmarked some cricketers from that tournament, who get an opportunity to bowl in the nets of visiting international teams. So, our players are happy, and they earned a lot of praise from the visiting players, especially Indian players, who felt that we are producing good talent now,” Ahmed explained.