Imran Khan interview: PCB raised prospect of cancelling Lord’s Test over Sky broadcast

By Jack Shaw · Lord’s, London · Published: 08:20 BST

• The PCB raised the prospect of cancelling the Lord’s Test and the rest of the tour if Sky aired an interview with Imran Khan’s sons, the BBC reports.
• A version of the interview was broadcast during lunch on day one — and Pakistan’s players came back out after the interval.
• Head coach Sarfaraz Ahmed says his squad knew nothing about it: “You’re talking about the interview? We don’t know about the interview.”

A Test at Lord’s came within a broadcast decision of being abandoned. The Imran Khan interview — Sky Sports’ sit-down with Suleiman and Kasim Khan, sons of the former Pakistan captain and prime minister — prompted the PCB to raise with the ECB the prospect of cancelling the second Test and the rest of the tour if it aired, according to BBC Sport. It aired. Pakistan played on.

Imran Khan interview: what happened at lunch on day one

The interview, conducted by former England captain Michael Atherton, aired during the lunch interval on day one. In it, Suleiman and Kasim Khan raised concerns over their father’s treatment and security, and criticised the UK government’s response. Imran Khan, 73, led Pakistan to World Cup glory in 1992 and was prime minister from 2018 to 2022; he has been jailed since 2023 on corruption charges he denies. Sky received a complaint before broadcast, and the ECB took advice from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. ESPNcricinfo understands the board also considered telling its players not to take the field after lunch.

Sarfaraz Ahmed distanced the dressing room from all of it at the close of day two. “I don’t know anything. I’m just focusing on the match,” he said. Asked whether his players might not have returned after the interval: “All are OK. We were having lunch at that time.” In Pakistan, where state broadcaster PTV is using Sky’s pictures, the interview was not shown. For the full timeline, follow the rolling coverage at ReadCricket.

The expert angle: why this is bigger than a broadcasting spat

Look at who is on each side of this. PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi is also Pakistan’s serving interior minister. That single fact separates this from a routine complaint about editorial content. A cricket board threatening to walk out of a Lord’s Test is one thing; a government minister’s board doing it over a broadcast concerning a jailed political opponent is another entirely — which is why the ECB went to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, not just to its broadcast partner.

The detail that should worry administrators is not the threat but how close it came to the players. Cricinfo’s reporting that the board weighed instructing the team not to resume, set against Sarfaraz insisting his squad was simply eating lunch, describes a sport in which professionals can be used as leverage without being told.

Nor is it isolated. Imran Khan’s medical care has drawn comment from senior figures across the game, with Australia captain Pat Cummins posting on X: “I hope Imran Khan is treated with the dignity anyone deserves.” When a serving Test captain of another country says that, the sport can no longer treat this as somebody else’s politics.

Wrap-up

The Test went on, and England are in complete control of it. But should a national board be able to put a Lord’s Test on the table over an interview it dislikes — and what does the ECB do if it happens again? Catch up on the cricket itself in our report on Ollie Robinson’s 4-11 routing Pakistan for 110 at Lord’s.