SAFF Championship: Pakistan football team receives Indian visas two days ahead of match against India

The Pakistan football team on Monday received the Indian visas ahead of their participation in the 2023 SAFF Championships. Their first match is scheduled against India on 21 June at 7.30 PM IST.

Following a delay of two days, the Pakistan Football Federation (PFF) received the approval of the visa, and the team is expected to fly to Bengaluru on the next available flight.

The eight-team SAFF Championship will take place in Bengaluru and is scheduled to kick off on 21 June, and will go on till 4 July. India have been clubbed with Pakistan, Kuwait and Nepal in Group A, while Group B consists of Bangladesh, Bhutan, Lebanon and Maldives.

Pakistan’s travel itinerary is still not clear.

Media reports say that the India and Pakistan match would only be rescheduled should Pakistan reach fail to land in Bengaluru by Tuesday night.

A Karnataka State Football Association (KSFA) official has told news agency PTI that they are not planning to reschedule the match.

“Yes we have been aware of the developmental about the Pakistan team getting visa clearance. We are hoping that they will be landing in Bengaluru on Tuesday ahead of the much-anticipated match against India on Wednesday. We are hoping for a sell-out crowd for the match here. We are all set to Stage the match, " a KSFA official said.

Meanwhile, the PFF had applied for visas at the Indian embassy in Mauritius and had hoped for the process to be completed by Saturday. However, the process eventually took time due to weekend non-working days.

Pakistan were in Mauritius to take part in a Four-Nation Cup tournament.

PFF has blamed the national Sports Board for the delay in issuing the NOC to travel to India while the Board has said that the application for NOC was submitted quite late.

Another report, in ESPN, said that the Pakistan team would arrive in Bengaluru less than 12 hours before their scheduled match against India on Wednesday.

“We plan to travel tomorrow. We’re looking for a morning flight, which would be ideal. However, if we take an evening flight then we will reach Mumbai at around 1 am on the morning of June 21. Since there are no flights that early in the morning, we might have to wait until 5 am to take a flight to Bengaluru. We would essentially land in Bengaluru around 8 am,” team manager Hasnain Haider was quoted as saying by ESPN.

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