PCB Threatens Walkout Over Atherton’s Interview with Imran Khan’s Sons at Lord’s

A cricket broadcast controversy erupted during the second Test between England and Pakistan at Lord’s after Sky Sports aired an interview with the sons of jailed former Pakistan prime minister and cricket legend Imran Khan, prompting a furious response from the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB).

The PCB made a formal complaint to Sky Sports after the broadcaster aired an interview with the sons of former prime minister and captain Imran Khan during the lunch interval on the first day at Lord’s. The interview, conducted by former England captain and current Sky commentator Michael Atherton, featured Imran Khan’s sons Sulaiman and Qasim discussing their father’s deteriorating health during his imprisonment.

What made the episode particularly dramatic was how close it came to disrupting play altogether. Cricinfo understands the PCB considered the option of Pakistan not taking the field after the break in protest, and is understood to have contacted Sky ahead of the lunch break, threatening that their players would not return to the field after lunch if it aired. Faced with this pressure, the broadcaster appeared to hesitate before proceeding. During those conversations, Sky delayed the interview, before eventually running the 18-minute clip. By the time the segment finished, play was set to resume as scheduled, and no walkout ultimately materialised, though the standoff behind the scenes underscored just how seriously the PCB viewed the broadcast.

The content of the interview itself was striking. Kasim and Sulaiman Khan, the former prime minister’s children from his marriage to Jemima Goldsmith, accused Pakistani authorities of “trying to kill” their imprisoned father in the pre-recorded segment conducted by former England captain Mike Atherton. They described a grim picture of his time behind bars. The brothers revealed their father has lost 80 per cent of his vision in one eye and spends more than 23 hours daily confined to a small cell without adequate air conditioning. One of the sons did not mince words, telling Atherton that authorities seemed intent on “just blatantly trying to kill him in there. Keep him in as long as possible, and silence him.”

Elsewhere in the conversation, Qasim Khan detailed his father’s visible distress during a recent visit, saying it was hard to reconcile with the calm demeanour Imran Khan was known for throughout his cricketing and political careers. Qasim Khan told Atherton, “Right now, it’s crucial for us that he gets proper treatment. When we saw him, he had an eye patch on from the eye situation; he seemed visibly stressed and that is something that is very hard to imagine. Because he embodies a very calm and assured kind of presence. So to hear him stressed, anxious or disturbed is very difficult.”

The PCB’s objection, according to reports, centred less on the health concerns raised and more on the political framing of the segment. According to The Guardian, PCB did not like that the official broadcaster of the Test series aired an interview which was heavily critical of the existing Pakistan government, and they have lodged a formal complaint with the company. Notably, the head of Pakistan’s cricket board occupies a dual role that blurs the line between sport and state. PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi also serves as Pakistan’s Interior Minister, placing him at the heart of both the cricketing and political dimensions of the row.

Interestingly, audiences in Pakistan itself were shielded from the broadcast entirely. In Pakistan, PTV, which is broadcasting the series, did not broadcast the interview. Meanwhile, Sky and the England and Wales Cricket Board largely stayed silent on the matter. Sky, although they have acknowledged the complaint, did not issue a formal response, and the ECB has also been made aware of the PCB’s grievances with the interview, although the ECB too are yet to come up with a response.

The interview arrived against a backdrop of mounting international concern for Imran Khan’s welfare. Imran’s health has been the focus of growing scrutiny over the past few weeks, with his sons stepping up their efforts to get him appropriate health care. Last week, Pakistan’s Supreme Court ordered him to be admitted to Shifa Hospital in the capital Islamabad, but instead, he was taken to the state-run PIMS, and returned to prison shortly after a check-up. Adding further weight to the story, 21 former captains, including Atherton, wrote a letter to Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, urging him to ensure Imran receives proper care in prison.

The episode has reignited long-running tensions around the mixing of sport and politics in Pakistani cricket, with the PCB once again finding itself accused of prioritising political sensitivities over press freedom, even as it insists its concerns were about fairness and context rather than suppressing difficult truths.