PAKISTAN Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Ehsan Mani was in a defiant mood today, as Test cricket returns to the country.

Pakistan’s decade-long isolation from hosting test cricket ends tomorrow when Sri Lanka will play at Pindi Cricket Stadium.

The second test will be in Karachi from December 19-23. The series is part of the world Test championship.

Sri Lanka were the last team to play a test in Pakistan in 2009. Terrorists attacked the team’s bus in Lahore and eight people were killed. Several Sri Lanka players and team officials were injured. The ambush shut the door on international cricket in Pakistan. The PCB organised almost all of their home matches in the United Arab Emirates.

And Mani has told future opponents that if they want to play a Test outside of Pakistan, they must have a valid reason why.

“The onus will be on the other teams to tell us why they can’t play in Pakistan,” he said.

“Our default position will remain that Pakistan is safe. We play cricket in Pakistan [and if] you want to play against Pakistan you have to come to Pakistan.”

In the last four years, the PCB staged short limited-overs tours against the likes of Zimbabwe, the West Indies, Sri Lanka and a World XI to show the cricket world it could host tours safely.

Sri Lanka agreed to play two Test matches in Pakistan only after it visited Karachi and Lahore three months ago and played an incident-free series of one-day internationals and Twenty20s.

“It’s only logical that cricket comes home,” Mani said. “People have a perception of Pakistan which is very, very different to the reality of what is happening on the ground in Pakistan today.

“The concerns that people had about Pakistan, certainly for the last year or two, were not what the ground reality is.”

Top cricketing officials from Australia, England, Ireland and the international players’ association have visited Pakistan in the last six months.

“When they see the ground reality, it’s a different attitude,” Mani said. “In fact, it was very nicely put by the chief executive of Cricket Ireland. He said: “I have to think of a reason why we shouldn’t be coming to Pakistan.’”

Mani said he has had discussions with officials from Cricket Australia and England and Wales Cricket Board and he hoped that both countries will tour Pakistan in the next three years.