Pakistan and India meet in the final of the Asian Games cricket tournament this weekend, and the question of how to watch it is more complicated than you might expect. The match streams for free in Singapore, South Korea, and Vietnam, but only if you are sitting in those countries. Everyone else needs a workaround, and that workaround comes with a price tag attached to it.
The fixture takes place at Korogi Sports Park, and the two teams will play for gold on Oct. 3 at 12:30 a.m. ET. The match is available to live stream for free on MeWatch in Singapore, KBS, MBC, and SBS in South Korea, and VTV in Vietnam. Those platforms are geo-restricted, which means you have to be in the country to see them. The workaround is a virtual private network, or VPN, which can hide your digital location and connect you to a server in another part of the world.
The Free Platforms
The free platforms are the whole story. MeWatch streams in Singapore, KBS, MBC, and SBS handle South Korea, and VTV runs in Vietnam. None of them let you watch from outside their home territory. That is the rule, and it is not new. What is new is how openly the workaround is being pitched alongside it.
The advice is simple: sign up for a streaming-friendly VPN, download the app to your device, connect to a server in Singapore, South Korea, or Vietnam, and watch the match from anywhere in the world. The catch is that the best VPNs are not free, though they do tend to offer free trials or money-back guarantees.
Why a VPN Costs Money
A VPN is a tool that hides your IP address by routing your internet traffic through a server in another location. The servers are hosted in countries around the world, and connecting to one in Singapore, South Korea, or Vietnam tricks the streaming platform into thinking your device is sitting in that country. It is a neat trick, and it works.
But the trick costs money. The VPN companies pay for those servers, and they charge users to cover the cost. The pitch is that you pay once for access to multiple platforms, not repeatedly for each one. The Asian Games final is the example here, and the example is a little awkward.
ExpressVPN Is the Pick
ExpressVPN is named as the recommended service for this task. The company operates servers in 105 countries, has an easy-to-use app available on all major devices, including iPhone, Android, Windows, Mac, and Linux, and maintains a strict no-logging policy. It also offers fast connection speeds free from throttling and allows up to 10 simultaneous connections.
A two-year subscription to ExpressVPN is on sale for $68.40 and includes an extra four months for free. That plan also includes a year of free unlimited cloud backup and the usual 30-day money-back guarantee. A one-month plan costs just $12.99.
Weekend Sport Schedule
This weekend’s sport calendar is full. The NFL, international soccer, and F1 are all on, and the Pakistan vs. India final stands out above the rest. India were expected to reach this stage, and they brought a strong squad to Japan. They still had to deliver on those expectations, and Pakistan will provide a tough test in the final.
India have not secured a gold medal just yet. The final is the last chance, and the match will settle it.
The Deal
The irony is that the free stream exists, and the only thing standing between you and it is a payment to a third party. That is the reality of global streaming today. The stream is free, but the path to it is not.
The VPN companies are not hiding this. They are selling access to content that is otherwise locked behind national borders. The Asian Games final is the latest example of that trade.
The final is at 12:30 a.m. ET on Oct. 3 at Korogi Sports Park. The platforms are free, but the workaround is not. That is the deal.
| Fixture | Date | Time (ET) |
|---|---|---|
| Pakistan vs. India final | Oct. 3 | 12:30 a.m. |
The weekend is busy, but this match is the one that matters. Pakistan and India, in the final of the Asian Games cricket tournament. It does not get any bigger than this, and the free stream is waiting for anyone willing to pay the toll.
Source material: “How to watch Pakistan vs. India in the Asian Games final online for free,” Mashable.
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