Faisal Irfan Mian in Sportz Insight:
This time it is personal. Long before I realized I loved the game of cricket, I remember hiding a transistor radio under the desk mid-lesson just to hear the score of the test match. Long before IPL and Stanford and Bollywood stars and commercial contracts, I remember improvising our writing pads into bats and scotch tape around scrunched up paper for a ball. It was just what you did as a Pakistani kid. This time it is personal. When I was fifteen and learned how to drive a car, I remember racing around the same Liberty round-about the bus was attacked. When I was 26, I remember sitting in the same Gaddafi stadium watching the same Sri Lanka chase 241 runs to become world champions. Yes, this time it is personal.
It is not that blowing up school children in a bus or businessmen in a hotel was any less tragic or underlined the ruthlessness and pointlessness of these perpetrators of terror any less. But targeting guest cricketers from a friendly country just crosses the line at so many different levels in the context of Pakistani culture.
More here.
