Overview

Located in the historical city of Lahore, the Gaddafi Stadium, named after the Libyan leader, was completely renovated during 1995-96 ready for the 1996 World Cup. Designed by the famous architect Nayyar Ali Dada who modelled it on the Mughal School of red hand-laid brickwork and arches, the new stadium is completely covered with plastic seating rather than concrete benches. The lower portion under the stands has been enclosed and converted to shops for boutiques and offices. This was the first stadium in Pakistan to be equipped with modern floodlights which have their own standby power generators. Modern facilities for the media are also provided.

Pakistan have enjoyed some memorable moments on the ground, including a fifth-wicket stand of 281 between Javed Miandad and Asif Iqbal against New Zealand in 1976 and an innings and 324 run win against New Zealand in 2002 The stadium hosted the final of the 1996 World Cup, which was watched by over 60,000 spectators. However, despite the impressive capacity, the ground is often sparsely attended for Test matches, with sometimes as few as 1000 fans turning up. One-day internationals, as with the whole of the subcontinent, are more popular; crowds in excess of 20,000 are common.
Andrew McGlashan