Ireland Cricket team will make a historic tour of Pakistan in 2025 as the two teams will meet for the first time in the 1992 ODI World Champions’ homeland. The tour was confirmed by both the boards late Monday evening when PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi met Cricket Ireland chair Brain MacNeice with the two nations set to play a bilateral series. The reported tour will take place in August-September 2025 with no venues yet fixed.
PCB confirms historic tour
“Chairman Cricket Ireland said that the Irish team would visit Pakistan next year in August-September for a Test series and would also review the possibility of a women’s team tour to Pakistan soon,” the PCB statement said.
This will be the first time Ireland will tour Pakistan for a bilateral series with their majority meetings coming in ICC tournaments on neutral venues. The tour was not part of the Future Tour Plan (FTP) but will now get underway in August 2025 after the conclusion of the 2025 World Test Championship (WTC). The confirmation of the tour came just hours after PCB released a statement about Ireland’s visit to Pakistan. Cricket Ireland put up a statement on its website and added it will be their second senior tour to Pakistan after their women’s team had done so in 2022.
In “wide-ranging discussions”, it merely confirmed that the two boards “were able to agree to a men’s tour next year – this will be yet another historic first, coming after the tour to Pakistan by our senior women in 2022.”
The two nations have developed a mini rivalry in recent times, one which had its early spark in the 2007 ODI World Cup. Ireland beat Pakistan in the ODI World Cup group stage match which eliminated the Men in Green. Since then, the two nations have often had heated battles on the cricket field including another defeat for Babar Azam’s men during the ongoing tour.
As things stand, the ongoing three-match T20I series taking place in Ireland has seen the spoils shared 1-1 with one match to go. Both teams will be participating in the upcoming T20 World Cup in the USA and the West Indies.