PSJF urges UAE to facilitate journalists to cover Asia Cup

• Sports journalists interested to cover seventeenth edition of 2025 Men’s Asia Cup cricket tournament, taking place till September 28 in UAE

Pakistan Sports Journalists Federation (PSJF) urged authorities in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to issue visas to beat reporters and journalists from Pakistan so that they can cover the seventeenth edition of the 2025 Men’s Asia Cup cricket tournament, taking place from September 9 to September 28. The matches are being played in the Twenty20 International (T20I) format.

In a joint statement, PSJF president Muhammad Iqbal Harper, Secretary General Muhammad Babar, and Central Executive Committee member Imran Sheikh said the sports journalists were interested to cover the Asia Cup cricket tournament, as the organizers – the Asian Cricket Council (ACC) and the Emirates Cricket Board (ECB) – already approved media accreditations along with a visa support letter to cover the event and related activities during the tournament.

They pointed out that the journalists with accreditation need visas to reach the event place, to cover matches, and to attend training sessions of the teams besides joining the press conferences before and after the matches. “We just want to cover all activities of the Asia Cup as per our routine reporting assignment,” they said, adding that they were expecting from the authorities to issue visas as soon as possible to the beat reporters.

“We always want to not limit our coverage to what is happening in the stadium and training sessions. We are more interested to dig out newsworthy stories among the fans as well,” they said. The PSJF already contacted the relevant authorities to issue visas to facilitate the beat reporters, but still not received any positive response from the visa officials. “During the matches, we believe that we may hear a good story about a team by listening to people talking on the matches.”

“We are feeling disappointment to see that we are facing uncertainty about obtaining visas to cover Asia Cup matches,” the PSJF leadership said. The tournament features eight teams. The five full members of the Asian Cricket Council, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, and Sri Lanka automatically qualified for the tournament and were joined by the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Hong Kong, the teams which finished in the top three in the 2024 ACC Men’s Premier Cup. India are the defending champions of 2023.