Rohit Sharma and Babar Azam met during the captains' day of the T20 World Cup
There's no denying that cricketers from India and Pakistan get along very well. The tension, drama, pressure, and weight of expectations surrounding an India-Pakistan match do not affect the players' relationships on either side.
One of the highlights of the Asia Cup in UAE was the friendship between India's top stars Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, and Rishabh Pant and Pakistan's mainstays Babar Azam, Shaheen Shah Afridi, and their coaches, Mohammad Yousuf and Saqlain Mushtaq.
ALSO READ: Gambhir has a piece of advice for India's top-order on facing Shaheen
Before the start of the eighth edition of the T20 World Cup, captains from all 16 teams spoke to the press in two groups in Melbourne. The second group included West Indies captain Nicholas Pooran, South Africa captain Temba Bavuma, Bangladesh captain Shakib Al Hasan, Zimbabwe captain Craig Ervine, and Scotland captain Richard Berrington, as well as India captain Rohit Sharma and his Pakistan counterpart Babar Azam.
Despite playing cricket for different nations, Rohit and Babar appeared to be friends. They heaped praise for each other throughout, but when a journalist asked about their conversations during tournaments, they explained the bond between India and Pakistan beautifully.
(Rohit Sharma is older than me. I try to take as much experience as possible from him as he has been playing for a long time.)," said Babar.
"As Babar said... We understand the game against Pakistan, but there is no point in discussing it every time and creating that pressure within yourselves. Whenever we meet against the Pakistan players, we met them in the Asia Cup and now... we talk about how things are back home, how the families are. Even our previous generation cricketers also told us the same thing. We just talk about what is going on, how is life and what new car they have bought or are about to buy)," Rohit said during the media session.
India and Pakistan are in the same group for the T20 World Cup Super-12 stage, which begins on October 22. They will begin their campaign against each other the following day in Melbourne. The last time India and Pakistan met in a World Cup match, India won by ten wickets, led by Babar Azam in Dubai. Since then, the two teams have met twice in the Asia Cup, with each winning once.