'Tom Curran went to the airport, but heard that the airport was closed.'
'Then he started crying like a little child. It took two or three people to handle him.'
As missiles rained down and the Pakistan Super League was suspended amid escalating India-Pakistan tensions, Bangladesh leg-spinner Rishad Hossain shared a chilling first-person account with Cricbuzz of how frightened overseas cricketers were when being evacuated from Pakistan.
The Pakistan Cricket Board initially explored shifting the PSL matches to the UAE, but the Emirates Cricket Board declined an invitation.
With no viable alternative, the PCB was forced to cancel the tournament, a decision that came just hours after the BCCI temporarily halted the IPL.
Foreign players in the PSL were evacuated to Dubai via chartered aircraft, from where they were booked on connecting flights to their home countries.
Rishad, who was part of the Lahore Qalandars squad in the 2025 Pakistan Super League, recalled the tension during that departure, telling Cricbuzz, 'Whenever I go out to play, my family worries for me whether the situation is good or not and now when they heard the news about Pakistan -- the bomb blasts and the missile strikes -- naturally they were in tension.'
Many foreign players, Rishad revealed, were traumatised by the experience. Among them was teammate Daryl Mitchell who said he would never return to Pakistan under such conditions.
'Foreign players like Sam Billings, Daryl Mitchell, Kushal Perera, David Wiese, Tom Curran... all of them were so frightened... Landing in Dubai, Mitchell told me that he would never go to Pakistan again, especially in this kind of scenario,' Rishad told Cricbuzz.
'He (Tom Curran) went to the airport, but heard that the airport was closed. Then he started crying like a little child, that it took two or three people to handle him,' Rishad added.
The PCB chairman attempted to relocate the PSL to Karachi, but government concerns and drone strikes made that untenable.
'The meeting was called to know our concerns. Almost all the foreign players said that the only safe place available for the later part of the tournament is Dubai.'
'The PCB chairman tried to convince us to conduct the remaining matches in Karachi. At that time he tried to hide from us that there were two drone attacks just the day before, which we came to know later.
'Later all of us took the decision (to shift to Dubai). The PCB chairman helped us a lot to reach Dubai safely by the grace of Almighty Allah.'
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