‘It was all an accident and Asif showed no hard feelings’
Shoaib Akhtar points a finger at teammate Shahid Afridi
KARACHI: Disgraced pacer Shoaib Akhtar said on Saturday that he accidentally hit Mohammad Asif with a bat and pointed the finger of blame at teammate Shahid Afridi saying that the all-rounder had provoked him.
“Afridi provoked me during the nets and used abusive language about my family,” claimed Shoaib, who was sent back to Pakistan from South Africa ahead of next week’s Twenty20 World Cup after a dressing room brawl with Asif.
“I got agitated and wanted to teach Afridi a lesson but Asif became an innocent victim of the whole incident,” Shoaib told this correspondent. “Asif is like my younger brother and I never wanted to harm him,” he added.
Shoaib, 31, said that he wanted to apologise to the entire nation over the Johannesburg episode and asked the cricket authorities of the country to show leniency.
His plea came soon after reports surfaced that President Pervez Musharraf, the chief patron of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), instructed the Board chairman Nasim Ashraf to take strict action against the misbehaving Shoaib.
“Please don’t portray me as a villain,” he said. “I’m only a human being and human beings can get provoked and can do things in the heat of the moment which they won’t even think about doing (in normal circumstances).”
Shoaib said that after the incident he went to Asif and asked for forgiveness. “Asif told me that he has no hard feelings,” said Shoaib adding that it was Afridi who ‘made use’ of the whole incident.
“I believe what happened in the dressing room that day should have stayed there,” he said. “But someone wanted to create disharmony in the Pakistan team and secretly leaked the story to the media.”
Shoaib said that a section of the media is against him and wants to see him out of the Pakistan team, permanently.
“But I want to continue playing for Pakistan because I honestly believe there is still a lot of cricket left in me and I can represent my country for five more years.”
Shoaib compared himself with French football star Zinedine Zidane and Bollywood actor Salman Khan saying that like them he is paying the price for being famous.
“The media is always after me because anything bad news linked to me is big news. It probably helps them selling their papers.”
Shoaib, who claimed he was offered a lucrative contract worth Rs 120 million by the breakaway Indian Cricket League (ICL), insisted that he will continue to opt for national duty over anything else.
But he added that the possibility of a lengthy ban slapped on him by the PCB may force him to consider other options. “I’m a professional cricketer and there is nothing else I can do but play cricket to earn my living.”
SOURCE: The News International: Latest News Breaking, World, Entertainment, Royal News