Sunil Gavaskar accuses England of playing blame game after CT 2025 exit, attacks Michael Atherton

England suffered a heartbreaking defeat to Afghanistan in Lahore and crashed out of the Champions Trophy 2025. After the loss, legendary India cricketer Sunil Gavaskar accused England of playing a blame game to cover their poor performance.

In a serious statement, Sunil Gavaskar claimed that England will start making excuses instead of focusing on the right areas for improvement. He even claimed that England will start blaming India for their loss since the Men in Blue are playing in Dubai due to a hybrid model.

It is to be noted that former England cricketer Michael Atherton recently raised concerns over the tournament's schedule and felt that India has an "undeniable advantage" of playing at just one ground while the other teams are traveling for their respective games.

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Sunil Gavaskar accuses England of playing blame game

While speaking on the Dressing Room show, Sunil Gavaskar took a brutal dig at England claiming that they will start playing the blame game now since they are out of the tournament.

“They will still come and start moaning the next morning. See they cannot lose. If they lose there has to be an excuse and the excuse cannot be that they weren’t better that day or the other team was better, they will start blaming everything," Gavaskar was quoted as saying by First Post.

Gavaskar also feels that the blame game will be directed at India too as Rohit Sharma and his men don't have to travel to play their matches. Gavaskar was taking a dig at Michael Atherton's comment in which he targeted India for getting an unfair advantage.

"They will start blaming India also because India are playing all their matches in Dubai and why are we not playing our matches at one venue," the former India opener added.

Even if India qualify for the knockouts, they will continue to play in Dubai. The final of the tournament will be played in Dubai or Lahore depending upon India's availability. It is to be noted that India have already qualified for the semi-finals and will play on March 4 in the first semi-final.

No ICC tournament can held without India- Sunil Gavaskar

Further speaking, Sunil Gavaskar wondered whether an ICC tournament could be organized without India. He challenged England's representative to ask this question in the ICC meetings.

“Their representatives at ICC should be asking why, but the other question is can you go into a tournament without India? India would have said no, then what happens?" Gavaskar added.

India are scheduled to play all their matches in Dubai due to the hybrid model. The BCCI had refused to send the Indian team to Pakistan due to the refusal of the Indian government. As a result, Dubai was picked as the venue where India will play all their matches.

Afghanistan knock England out

The match between Afghanistan and England went down to the wire. Afghanistan scored 325-7 after batting first on the back of a magnificent hundred from Ibrahim Zadran.

In reply, England fell just 8 runs short of the target. Despite Joe Root playing a magnificent 120, they were unable to breach the target and lost the game.