The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) has officially announced the relocation of ongoing first-class matches in the President’s Trophy Grade 1 tournament out of Peshawar and Abbottabad. This decisive operational shift comes in the wake of escalating political turmoil in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, where both cities are situated. The federal government of Pakistan recently declared a state of emergency and imposed governor’s rule across the region, triggering immediate security reassessments for all public events, including elite domestic sports fixtures.
With security deployment heavily intensified across the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region to manage the unfolding political crisis, the PCB elected to move the scheduled fixtures to neutral venues in Punjab to ensure the safety and well-being of players, match officials, and tournament staff. Prior to this disruption, the 2026 edition of the President’s Trophy had successfully utilized four distinct host cities, with Islamabad and Rawalpindi serving alongside Peshawar and Abbottabad as the primary hubs for the multi-team red-ball competition.
While the matches hosted in the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi remain entirely unaffected by the emergency measures and will continue strictly as scheduled—with the sixth round of the tournament commencing on Monday—the fixtures originally slotted for Peshawar’s Imran Khan Stadium and the Abbottabad Cricket Stadium required a complete logistical overhaul. The Pakistan Cricket Board acted swiftly to reassign these high-stakes matches to alternative venues within the Punjab province.
The match between Ghani and the Hyderabad Kingsmen Academy, originally intended for Peshawar, has been rescheduled to begin on October 14 at the Rana Naveed Academy located in Sheikhupura. Meanwhile, the fixture featuring Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited against the Oil and Gas Development Company Limited has been moved to the LCCA Ground, which is situated directly adjacent to the historic Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore.
As the tournament approaches its critical conclusion, this ongoing round marks the penultimate stage of the highly competitive league phase. According to information obtained by Cricinfo, the LCCA Ground in Lahore is also slated to host the subsequent final-round fixture between Markhor IT Solutions and Pakistan Television, commonly known as Pakistan TV. Concurrently, the National Cricket Ground in Islamabad has been designated to host the crucial matchup between Hyderabad Kingsmen Academy and the State Bank of Pakistan, adding to the venues utilized in the capital alongside the Diamond Club ground.
To accommodate these sudden logistical adjustments and ensure adequate rest and travel time for the competing squads, the final round of league matches has been pushed back by a single day, with the action now scheduled to commence on October 19.
The league stage of the President’s Trophy Grade 1 is structured in a traditional round-robin format, requiring all eight participating teams to face each other once over the course of the season. Upon the completion of the round-robin matches, the top two teams on the points table will advance to compete directly in the tournament final. At present, the venue for the title-deciding fixture remains unconfirmed by the cricket board, pending further review of logistical considerations and security protocols across potential host cities.
The disruption in Peshawar and Abbottabad represents a notable setback for the PCB’s ongoing efforts to revitalize red-ball cricket infrastructure outside traditional metropolitan centers. The Abbottabad Cricket Stadium has long maintained a reliable status as a regular host of domestic first-class cricket, providing a picturesque backdrop and competitive pitches for senior men’s red-ball tournaments over the years.
Similarly, the return of senior men’s domestic cricket to the Imran Khan Stadium in Peshawar during the previous season—after an extended hiatus of almost seven years—had been hailed as a major milestone for the region. The venue hosted nine competitive matches during the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, following extensive renovations funded and overseen by the board as part of a broader mandate to bring top-flight cricket back to passionate local fans in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Peshawar had also been awarded its maiden Pakistan Super League (PSL) fixture for the year, a decision made after the city successfully demonstrated its hosting capabilities during a trial run at the National T20 Cup earlier in the season. However, the PCB was ultimately forced to scale back that particular tournament plan, restricting matches exclusively to Lahore and Karachi in compliance with broader federal government fuel-conservation measures implemented in response to the ongoing West Asia crisis.
On the field, the President’s Trophy Grade 1 has delivered intense competition as teams battle for supremacy in the standings. The State Bank of Pakistan currently commands the top position on the tournament points table with an impressive total of 84 points. They are closely followed by Ghani, who occupy second place with 70 points, keeping the pressure on the league leaders as the round-robin phase nears its completion.
Further down the standings, Hyderabad Kingsmen Academy, Pakistan TV, Markhor IT Solutions, and the Oil and Gas Development Company Limited have each secured a single victory thus far, keeping them in the hunt for crucial points. Conversely, Khan Research Laboratories and Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited—who memorably contested the final of the tournament last season—have endured a difficult campaign and are still searching for their first win of the current competition.
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