Pakistan’s red-ball skipper Shan Masood has refused to promote a gambling company's logo as he is currently leading Yorkshire in the County Championship.
Yorkshire recently signed a two-year deal with Dafabet which included displaying their logo on players’ shirts across all cricket formats but that will not be the case with Masood due to his personal beliefs.
Gambling is legal in countries like England, Australia and others as sponsorship deals between clubs and betting companies are very common but surrogate advertising is not allowed in Pakistan due to the government’s strict regulations.
Dafabet previously sponsored in Pakistan under the name “Dafa News” but was ultimately banned due to the government’s policies.
As per the sources, Shan communicated his decision not to endorse the company’s logo to the Yorkshire management and county authorities and his side respected his stance.
Earlier, Shan spoke to Geo News where he said that representing Yorkshire at the iconic Lord’s Cricket Ground is a privilege and he feels proud to lead the team.
“It’s a privilege enough to play at this historic cricket ground let alone captaining a team at this level. In a player’s cricketing career, there are some checklists like playing and scoring at famous venues. I played my first ever county championship game here too while playing for Derbyshire CCC in 2022 when I scored 91 and 62 runs to save the match,” Shan told Geo News.
“I still remember when the first time I played here for Pakistan was during the famous 2016 test match against England, which became famous of then team captain Misbah-ul-Haq’s press ups celebrations after scoring a century and subsequently the team’s post-victory salute and press-ups in front of the pavilion”.
Although his first outing for Yorkshire this season was a total failure as he got out without scoring after just six deliveries against Leicestershire CCC but made a strong comeback in the next game against Gloucestershire CCC.
In the first innings of the match, Shan scored a magnificent century, match-saving innings of 140 runs of 180 deliveries after players like Joe Root and Harry Brooks failed and got out cheaply and Yorkshire lost half of their team for just 90 runs.