AFG vs NZ Test: Afghanistan had 3 options… still why is the test being held at Greater Noida Stadium, know the reason

AFG vs NZ Test at Greater Noida Stadium: The only Test match between Afghanistan and New Zealand is being played at the Shaheed Vijay Parthik Sports Stadium in Greater Noida. The match was scheduled to start on September 6, but due to the poor condition of the stadium after the rain, the first two days of play could not take place at all.

Due to rain, the condition of the stadium has become very bad. The management could not repair the pitch and outfield for two days. For this, it even hired fans and covers, but was unsuccessful.

Why was this stadium chosen out of the 3 despite the ban?

This is a home test for the Afghanistan team, because due to political problems the team cannot play international matches at home. But a big thing has come to light here that Afghanistan was given the option of three venues to play this one-off test match.

This included Kanpur, Bangalore and Greater Noida. But despite this, Afghanistan chose the Greater Noida Stadium. The special thing is that BCCI has banned this stadium. Now the question arises that why did it do this? The answer to this is Delhi being close.

Actually, Delhi is very close to Noida and from here the Afghanistan team gets a direct flight to Kabul. This is the reason why the Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) chose Greater Noida for this one-off test. But seeing the poor condition here, the board has said that now it will never play any match in this stadium.

This stadium has been banned

The last international match was played here in March 2017, when a white ball series was played between Afghanistan and Ireland. At the end of this year, in September 2017, cases of match fixing in corporate matches came to light, then BCCI banned the stadium.

On the other hand, BCCI had announced in 2016 that this stadium will be the home ground of the Afghanistan cricket team. This happened when the ICC gave this stadium the status of an international cricket stadium. Despite being given the status by the ICC and being banned by the BCCI, Afghanistan chose this stadium.