Misbah Breaks Silence on Sudurpaschim Match 8 Delay

Sudurpaschim Royals head coach Misbah-ul-Haq has given his side of Saturday night's delayed five-over match against Biratnagar Kings, saying his players refused to risk injury on a wet outfield and questioning why captain Dipendra Singh Airee was not invited to the post-match presentation.

Misbah's Safety Case in His Own Words

Speaking to Kantipur at the team hotel on Sunday afternoon, Misbah-ul-Haq gave the fullest account yet of why Sudurpaschim Royals hesitated before the five-over match against Biratnagar Kings on Saturday night. The Misbah account, reported by The Kathmandu Post on Monday, turns on one judgement: the ground was not safe enough to risk a squad with most of the league still to play.

“It is very early in the tournament,” Misbah said. “You have to play the next four league games and then maybe the playoffs, finals. And risking everybody for this game, it’s not worth it.” In his telling, the choice was never about one night’s result. A twisted ankle or a pulled muscle on a wet outfield could have ended a player’s tournament, and the Royals were not willing to pay that price for a five-over contest.

Misbah listed the conditions as he saw them: “One light tower wasn’t working, there was moisture on the pitch, and there was water all around the surface.” He added: “Everybody knows it—no one can run at their full throttle [in such conditions]. So, what’s the point of having that game?” He recalled Ishan Pandey slipping badly at the boundary and Sherfane Rutherford fielding with his hands in his pockets, unable to use a substitute fielder, as evidence that the players’ fears were borne out once play began.

The head coach was blunt about the pressure the team felt once officials had decided the match would go ahead. “Our players did not want to take the risk of getting injured,” he said. “When you are asked that either you just play or you have to forfeit and give two points, you are left with no choice.” That framing matters: the Royals did play, and lost by 35 runs, but Misbah insists they did so under protest rather than by agreement.

The Agreement Dispute at the Centre of the Delay

The two sides still disagree about what was agreed, and when. Asked whether the team first said yes to the reduced match and later denied it, Misbah replied: “They decided that we are going to play this game and later they were saying that we never agreed.” The Kathmandu Post’s account notes that match referee Wendell Labrooy spent much of the evening talking with the Royals’ head coach, skipper and manager, while the Kings squad waited, and that Cricket Association of Nepal secretary Paras Khadka joined the referee to mediate.

The timeline both sides broadly accept runs like this: a toss at 7:25 pm and a 7:41 pm start were scheduled for the five-over contest, but no toss took place. It was finally at 8:54 pm that the toss was announced again, this time for 9 pm, and after a further hold-up over the Royals’ lineup, the coin was tossed at 9:06 pm. Misbah says the team was not ready to play even then.

OnlineKhabar’s earlier report of the same night gives the officials’ version of that gap. CAN secretary Paras Khadka told OnlineKhabar the match had to go ahead once the match referee and umpires declared conditions fit, and that the delay came because Sudurpaschim’s overseas players were unwilling to play and had to be persuaded. The new interview does not settle that contradiction; it sharpens it, by putting the Royals’ version on the record in the coach’s own words. The rulebook questions raised that night were examined in our earlier Match 8 report.

The Laws of Cricket, quoted in The Kathmandu Post’s report, sit awkwardly between the two accounts. Conditions are not dangerous merely because they are not ideal, and wet grass and a wet ball alone do not make them unreasonable. But they are dangerous when a wet, slippery ground deprives a bowler of a foothold, a fielder of free movement, or a batter of the ability to play strokes or run. Which side of that line Kirtipur fell on is exactly what the two camps still dispute.

The Missing Captain at the Presentation

After Biratnagar sealed a 35-run win, the post-match presentation told its own story. Dipendra Singh Airee, the Royals’ skipper, was not seen, and presenter Andrew Leonard spoke only with Biratnagar captain Sandeep Lamichhane. While Lamichhane attended the post-match press conference, nobody from the Royals’ side did.

Misbah says the captain’s absence from the presentation was not the team’s choice. “The surprising thing was that our captain wasn’t invited to the presentation ceremony. How can you do that?” he questioned. “Okay, the game happened, whatever the controversy, but why are you not inviting a team’s captain at the presentation and only allowing one team to come and speak?”

That complaint is the part of the interview most likely to linger, because it is a question of protocol rather than of playing conditions. A losing captain is routinely heard at a presentation, win or lose, and a controversy on the field does not normally remove that courtesy. If Airee was indeed not invited, the organisers owe an explanation; if he declined, that too should be stated plainly.

The Organisers' Reply and What Happens Next

NPL tournament director Dhirendra Saud gave Kantipur the organisers’ side. He said Sudurpaschim were once ready to play, but after a discussion within the team, they said no. “In cricket, we follow what the match referee decides regarding playing conditions. The match officials had given green light for the match after multiple inspections and discussions with the ground staff,” Saud said.

Saud also made the case for playing on, in terms of the people who had waited. “Moreover, the fans had waited hours for the match yesterday. And the investment by the teams is huge, CAN has worked very hard for cricket development,” he said. “So, we moved forward with the match after consulting with the match referee.” He claimed Saturday’s scenario would not repeat again.

Here the episode stops being a story about one wet evening and becomes a test of the tournament. The Royals return on Monday against Chitwan Rhinos, and every future rain delay will now be judged against Saturday night: will officials publish a clear cutoff and stick to it, and will both captains be heard afterwards whatever happened on the field? Misbah said he did not want to blame anyone, but added that the situation “could have been managed better by the match officials, the tournament committee, and unanimously by the teams.”

His closing advice points to the standard he wants applied next time: “Whenever this sort of situation happens, don’t just take one point into consideration. Just see if the conditions are perfect to play, or at least playable where the players are safe and can give their 100 percent, and then the match officials should decide to have a game. Not a 50/50 situation where they see it’s dangerous but still decide to play, because in the longer run, that creates these sorts of situations.” Whether CAN answers with a rule, a protocol or simply a promise, the next wet night at Kirtipur will show whether Saturday changed anything at all. Fans can follow the Royals’ next outing on the live scores page and check the schedule and the points table as the league stage moves on.