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NZ players were crying in swimming pool: Inzamam recounts 2002 bomb blast
The second match of the series was slated to take place in Karachi but the series was abandoned mid-way after a bomb blast near the team hotel.
Former Pakistan captain and chief selector Inzamam-ul-Haq is one of the finest batsmen to have come out of the country. He was a pillar of strength for his team in the middle order through the 90s and the first decade of 2000s.
A stalwart in both Tests and ODIs, Inzamam registered his highest international score in the summer of 2002. Batting against New Zealand on a deadpan surface at Lahore’s Gaddafi Stadium, Inzamam extracted a massive toll from the Kiwi attack, hitting them for 329 runs with the help of 38 boundaries and 9 maximums.
It was a match to forget for the Kiwis who were destroyed by Shoaib Akhtar in the first innings as they succumbed to an innings defeat. The second match of the series was slated to take place in Karachi but the series was abandoned mid-way after a bomb blast near the team hotel.
Inzamam, recently spoke about the incident on his youtube channel while speaking about his knock of 329 against Kiwis.
“None of the players got injured but that was a scary day. My room was on the side where the impact of the blast took place. Thankfully I wasn’t in the room as the glass on the window panes broke and hit the wall on the opposite side.
“We were just about to leave for the ground when the incident took place. Players were mostly leaving for breakfast. I heard something but couldn’t understand what had happened. All the curtains and window panes had broken. I asked a guard and he told me there was a bomb blast.
“I was asked to go down and there I saw all the New Zealand players in the swimming pool and they were all crying. These players had never experienced something like this back home,” Inzamam said while recounting the horrific incident.
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He further added that the Kiwis went back home but the Pakistani players had to deal with the trauma of the blast.
“The players of our team were troubled for at least a week if not more,” he said.
The blast had taken place in front of the neighbouring Sheraton Hotel where a sucide bomber had detonated a bomb inside a car. 11 French engineers who were in a bus died along with two Pakistanis and the bomber himself.
