The man who led the Blackcaps' abandoned tour to Pakistan in 2002 says he probably wouldn't go if he were part of the current side, which is scheduled to play there next month.
Stephen Fleming has recalled how he felt the force of the bomb blast just outside the team hotel, which killed 14 people.
He's now urging caution over what lies ahead for the current national side, which departed Auckland late on Monday for Bangladesh and Pakistan.
"I think with the experience we had 18 years ago, the answer is probably no," Fleming tells Newshub, when asked if he'd be willing to travel to Pakistan.
A suicide bomber killed 14 people outside the team hotel where Fleming was having breakfast.
"The next thing sitting on my backside with that all over my chest," he recalls. "It was just the force of a bomb blast that was 20, 30 metres away."
And now there are fears attacks like that could happen again, after the Taliban swept to power north of the border in Afghanistan.
They gave safe haven to Al-Qaeda, who claimed responsibility for the 2002 attack.
"As a players group and from New Zealand Cricket's point of view that the security checks that they do and that, we have full faith in that," says Blackcaps batsman Henry Nicholls "I know that's being completed at the moment."
That security check is being conducted by Reg Dickason, who was with the team that fateful day in 2002.
"I remember him grabbing me by the scuff of the neck and putting us in the car park of all places," Fleming continues.
And while the team are all but locked in to tour Pakistan for the first time in 18 years, the findings of Dickason's reconnaissance could still change that.
"We have a lot of trust in that," says Nicholls. "We know that they won't put us in any undue danger and we know that Pakistan will be doing everything they can to have cricket."
And now a nervous wait for the findings of the ongoing investigation, which will decide if the first of three ODIs takes place in Pakistan on September 17.
"I'd be very nervous but I do appreciate 18 years is a long time," notes Fleming.
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