Babar Azam loses cool over pitch invasion, throws away fan's phone

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Test captain Babar Azam on Wednesday was enraged by yet another pitch invasion during the ongoing President's Trophy Grade-I and threw away the mobile phone of one of his fans, who swarmed onto the field here at the Diamond Cricket Ground.

Babar, who is representing the Oil and Gas Development Company Limited (OGDCL) in the ongoing eight-team tournament, has been attracting strong fandom since making his long-awaited return to domestic cricket after a gap of seven years.

A similar occurrence happened during the opening day of OGDCL's fourth-round match against State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) as two fans stormed onto the field hoping to get a selfie with the star batter.

In the video going viral on social media, one fan was seen moving towards Babar with a phone in hand, whom the national cricketer pushed away before being approached by another enthusiast.

The star batter turned his attention towards the second fan and threw his phone away before gesturing to all the invaders to leave the field.

Babar's enraged reaction to the pitch invasion came just hours after the right-handed batter registered yet another modest score for OGDCL as he was dismissed for just 21 runs off 39 deliveries in their first innings, in which the department could only accumulate 196 before getting bowled out in 50 overs.

Earlier, in his previous appearance for OGDCL, which was his first in the domestic circuit since the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy (QEAT) final in December 2019, Babar registered meagre scores of 12 and four, respectively, in the two innings.

In the first innings, Babar Azam was bamboozled by a short-pitched delivery by Arshad Iqbal. The right-handed batter attempted to pull it towards the on-side but could not cope with the bounce and ended up top-edging it for a straightforward catch to the fielder positioned at mid-wicket.

Whereas, in the second innings, he was trapped lbw by fellow Test cricketer Faheem Ashraf.