KARACHI: There was a sense of calm at the National Bank Stadium here on Thursday with doubt over its readiness for the upcoming ICC Champions Trophy having been quashed.

Journalists recording videos for their personal YouTube channels, who sounded concerned a week ago, were now full of pride, hitting back at their Indian counterparts and followers from across the border, who had posed serious questions over the Pakistan Cricket Board’s ambitious attempt at renovating three venues a hundred odd days ahead of the eight-team extravaganza.

The criticism levelled against the PCB a few days ago had now turned into praise as excitement seeped into the atmosphere, unofficially establishing that the Champions Trophy was truly on.

The cranes were still there, so were the tractors, the dumpers and the trucks. The sounds of the hammers and the iron rods and drill machines still reverberated across the empty stands.

Seats were still being installed in some of the enclosures with the older ones gathered not so neatly within the premises of the ground. Dust still rose from the roads encircling the stadium and walls — both on the inside and the outside of the arena — were still being whitewashed.

It’s true that the work isn’t complete, but it’s well in its finishing stages.

Big SMD (Surface-Mount Device) screens — of the “best quality in the world” as the PCB officials claim — have been installed. A week ago, only the foundations were being laid for their large steel columns and it was hard to believe that the screens would be mounted within the short deadlines.

Those columns have very obviously distorted the view from the general stands on both sides of the stadium. Probably the spectators affording the cheapest available tickets would require the screen more than anyone else.

They won’t be disappointed with the screens as, perhaps, they would be with the naked-eye view. The SMDs are bright ones, so bright that the way brighter sun shining on the venue couldn’t blind the colours on it as the technicians prepared to test them.

“We had clear instructions from the [PCB] chairman to remove any kind of obstructions that could affect the spectators’ view, which is why we went for the steel structures,” Bilal Chauhan, the board’s manager for the project, told reporters about the screens’ placement. “But we know that there will still be some hindrance.

“However, it’s still better than placing the screen right in front of the stands,” he added pointing out how a giant display screen in the past made the Naseem-ul-Ghani enclosure completely dysfunctional.

Most importantly, though, the new pavilion building, the main part of the venue’s upgradation, is “100 per cent complete” according to Bilal, a Lahore-based consultant engineer.

The building, housing around 1000 spectators in galleries and VVIP boxes, as well as the chairman’s box and the PCB’s offices, has been decorated with cladding sheets of three to four different shades of blue and white; it’s funky look giving the venue a prominent facelift.

Unlike spectators in general stands, who would have to do with a distorted view due to the screens, the ones watching from the new four-floor building would have a top-class viewing experience.

However, the small-sized Zaheer Abbas and Fazal Mahmood enclosures at the front of the new building have fences installed in front of them.

From other enclosures, the view is improved, the fences are shorter and have more space to look through, but not as perfect as it would be for spectators in Lahore — the Gaddafi Stadium there having a moat along the ground’s circumference.

The light towers have brand new lights on them, some say they are AI-controlled lights and brighter than those which used to illuminate the stadium in the past.

Bilal said workers were busy “angling” the LED lamps according to a certain geometric framework on the huge frames atop the towers, which, he had claimed, would allow a world-class lighting experience.

The upgradation of the venue — which will be inaugurated by President Asif Ali Zardari on Feb 11 — will be truly tested in the third match of the tri-nation series between Pakistan and South Africa a day later, two days before the final of the tournament also involving New Zealand.

The Champions Trophy opener will be played bet­ween Pakistan and New Zealand on Feb 19.

Published in Dawn, February 7th, 2025