ODI World Cup 2023: Mickey Arthur Takes Dig At BCCI After Pakistan’s Loss To India, Says ‘Didn’t Seem Like An ICC Event’

Mickey Arthur is in India for the ODI World Cup 2023 as a Pakistan team director. This is his second innings with Pakistan after serving as a head coach before.

Written by: Koushik Paul

Updated: October 15, 2023, 7:46 AM IST

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https://www.india.com/sports/ind-vs-pak-odi-world-cup-2023-mickey-arthur-takes-dig-at-bcci-after-pakistan-loss-to-india-says-didnt-seem-like-an-icc-event-6413928/ Copy

Pakistan team director Mickey Arthur addresses the media after losing against India in ODI World Cup 2023. (Image: X)

New Delhi: Pakistan cricket team director Mickey Arthur has expressed disappointment over the pre-match and mid-innings music shows calling the ongoing ODI World Cup 2023 a ‘BCCI event and not an ICC event’ after the Men in Green lost to India by seven wickets at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on Saturday.

While the likes of Arijit Singh, Sunidhi Chauhan and Shankar Mahadevan enthralled the audience pre-match, artists like Darshan Raval and Sukhwinder Singh set the stage on fire during the mid-innings break.

“It didn’t seem like an ICC event tonight. It seemed like a BCCI event. I didn’t hear ‘Dil Dil Pakistan’ coming through the mics too often. I won’t use this as an excuse,” Arthur, who had served as Pakistan’s head coach earlier, said after the game.

Sent into bat first, Pakistan could only manage 191 in 42.5 overs with Babar Azam (50) and Mohammad Rizwan (49) scoring the bulk of the runs. For India, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammad Siraj, Hardik Pandya, Kuldeep Yadav and Ravindra Jadeja took two wickets apiece.

In reply, Pakistan were blown away by Rohit Sharma 86 and Shreyas Iyer’s unbeaten 50 as the hosts registered their third win on the trot and eighth over the arch-rivals in ODI World Cup history.

“I didn’t hear Dil Dil Pakistan coming through the microphones too often tonight. So yes, that does play a role, but I’m not going to use that as an excuse because for us, it was about living the moment, it was about the next ball and it was about how we were going to combat the Indian players tonight,” he added.

The South African was referring to Pakistan supporters not being given visas for the ODI World Cup 2-23 till date but when probed further, he refrained from elaborating. Meanwhile, a BCCI official gave back to Arthur with a tongue-in-cheek response.

“No harm in playing Dil Dil Pakistan. But do tell us when would it be played? When Babar was bowled or Rizwan got dismissed? Or when Rohit hit Shaheen for a six. You can only play it for fans and there were no fans,” the official told BCCI.