Former India all-rounder Irfan Pathan on Thursday made a startling revelation that one of the fans in Peshawar had thrown an iron nail at him which missed his eyes by a whisker during the team’s visit to Pakistan, where the match had to be stopped for 10 minutes.
Irfan’s comments came days after Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) filed a complaint to ICC over alleged “inappropriate crowd behavior” targeted at the Pakistan squad during the match on October 14, 2023 at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.
The 38-year-old Pathan slammed PCB for making an issue of the crowd’s behaviour, instead of focusing on cricket in the field.
“Peshawar me ham khelne gaye the, tab ek Pakistani fan ne meri aankh k niche keel mardi thi. Lekin humne iss baat ka batangad ni banaya. (We were playing a game in Peshawar, when a fan threw a nail at me, which struck me under my eye. I could have gotten seriously injured. The match was halted for 10 minutes, but we did not pay any heed to it as we were playing good cricket),” said Pathan on commentary during the ODI World Cup 2023 match between India and Bangladesh in Pune
“Pakistan should stop making issues of crowd’s behaviour in India. They shouldn’t stretch things over here,” he added.
Following the revelation, former India batter Aakash Chopra backed Irfan with a post on social media platform, ‘X’.
“Didn’t know that fans in Peshawar threw a nail at Irfan, which hit him under the eye. Remember the game getting stopped for a bit bcoz of fan trouble but it’s only today I got to know the exact reason. Well done, @IrfanPathan for keeping the big-picture in mind. Love you bro ,” wrote Aakash.
Pathan replied to Chopra’s post and wrote ” I Would have taken it to my grave brother cos I think fans are the utmost important to this game and things do happen. But the narrative is set differently nowadays with some ppl trying to spread unnecessary negativity for their own benefit. So i spoke. Love you brother “.
Meanwhile, ICC is set to take no action on PCB’s complaint as the apex body’s anti-discrimination code of conduct is applicable to individuals and not to the entire crowd.
“The ICC takes every complaint very seriously but the code is about individuals. I don’t know what exactly the PCB is looking at but it will be very difficult to take any tangible action,” a veteran official, who has worked in both BCCI and ICC told PTI on conditions of anonymity.
“The ICC may identify individuals if there are charges of racism but if thousands of people are shouting a slogan, what can you do? No player was injured by any ‘missile’ hurled from the gallery? A partisan crowd is expected. That’s the pressure of elite sport,” he added.