Test Match Special - Lahore 2009: Cricket’s terror attack 10 years on

Episode Date: March 3, 2019

Trevor Bayliss and Paul Farbrace explain what it was like to be in the Sri Lanka team bus that was attacked 10 years ago in Lahore, Pakistan. Islamist militants fired rockets and machine guns at the convoy as it reached the stadium. Six police officers and two civilians died in the attack. Many in the Sri Lankan team, including Farbrace, were injured.

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Ten years ago today, the Sri Lankan cricket team were heading to the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore for the third day of the second test against Pakistan. As the bus approached the ground, it was ambushed by around 12 Islamist militants at a roundabout. Armed with assault rifles, rocket launchers and grenades, they opened fire on the team, the police protecting it, and the van behind carrying the match officials. Six police officers and two civilians died in the attack with many of the Sri Lankan squad. Sri Lankan squad injured. No test cricket has been played in Pakistan since. A decade on, the Sri Lankan coach Trevor Bayliss and his assistant Paul Farbrace, both now with England,

of course, tell the horrific story of what that day was like. For the first time since the Munich Olympic Games in 1972, international sportsmen have been targeted specifically by terrorists. The major terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan team was they were just half a mile away from the stadium. It was quite a sophisticated ambush. Cars were used, a grenade was held, a traffic was stopped, and then three gunmen ran into the street, fired at a police ice school, in which the police officer was killed, and then spray machine guns, the coach.

A rocket launcher was also fired. It narrowly missed the bus. It was trying to get to the floor, and I think probably a little bit slow to get down. Eventually I did get down, and that's where I spent the next, what seemed like, ages and ages, but probably only a matter of minutes before we were driven into the stadium. There were five of us in the back of the van, all lying on the floor, listening to the crack of bullets,

hitting the van, and every time you heard a crack, you just thought, this bullet's for me. Aram Bram Khan saying at the time, in his view, terrorists would never target cricketers because it wouldn't actually help their cause. Well, all of that has now gone out of the window. I can't see cricket going back there in the distant future.

My name is Paul Farbrace. I'm the assistant coach of the England cricket team and in March 2009 I was the assistant coach of the Sri Lankan cricket team. Trevor Bayliss, head coach of the England cricket team and in 2009 I was the head coach of Sri Lanka. We'd been to Pakistan twice before. We went for the Asia Cup and then we were there for a three-match one-day series as well.

We were actually on a tour of Bangladesh over the Christmas period. I'd actually had a flight booked home to Australia on the early January and midway through, I think, the last test in Bangladesh, the manager got us together and had a team meeting and said we're now flying directly from Dhaka to Karachi to play some one-day matches, three one-day matches against Pakistan. then we would fly home to Sri Lanka and play five ODIs against India and then back to Pakistan to play two tests against Pakistan.

I think India had pulled out of a series against Pakistan at that time and we were taking their place. We had a couple of meetings as a playing group and as a management group with the team manager with information coming through from the board and there was a lot of questions about security and we were promised presidential security. And to be fair, I probably view it.

it on the basis that I'd been living in Sri Lanka. The civil war was still going on at that stage. My two years had been, just over two years, the civil war was going on, there were bombs, there were attacks, you know, so, you know, I sort of worked on the basis that you could be anywhere in the world, you know, you could be, you know, on the wrong tube in London on any given day, and you could get caught up in something horrendous. So I took them at their word, that there was going to be a high level of security and also thought that we had an obligation to go and support Pakistan cricket

based on the fact that teams were still coming to Sri Lanka and they were getting support from teams around the world and it was important that I think that we continue to do the same thing planning on going home after the last test in DACA and then all of a sudden having to jump on a plane directly to Karachi didn't really give the guys time to sort of think about very much at all We played three one days, one in Lahore and one had been two in Lahore and one in Karachi. We played those in January and then went back to Sri Lanka for those five ODIs against India.

So we'd been there only a month or two before and there was no problems. We played the first test in Karachi, which had been a massive eye-opener in terms of the amount of security. I don't think I've ever seen anything like it. The amount of security we had on the amount of protection around the team, The one thing that happened on that morning was that the Pakistan team bus was delayed. We travelled in convoy, so the two team buses with the umpires minivan sandwiched in between. So we'd always travelled as a convoy in the previous couple of days. That morning they were delayed for whatever reason and we went on ahead without them.

But it wasn't something that I was nervous about. It wasn't something I particularly thought that's strange or unusual. And I do. I remember the journey in. I mean, Lahore is a, I think, is a wonderful city. Very wide roads, very clean city. And it was somewhere that not far from the roundabout where the attack took place was a Gloria Jean's coffee shop. And I'd sat outside there at about 10 o'clock one night with Yasser Arafat, who was in the Pakistan team. And he'd been at Kent as an overseas player. So I knew Yasser very well. I'd sat with him and one of his cousins. And we sat talking cricket. I don't think for one second I was concerned about security in Lahore I mean it just seemed like such a lovely city as I said been there a couple of times before always enjoyed it we had a fantastic hotel

got on the bus and that's been about 845 in the morning I think just a normal trip to the to the stadium you know the guy sitting up the front I usually sat to back from the from the driver. Dill Shanwell, I think, was in the seat in front of me between myself and the driver.

We were obviously escorted through, so there was no traffic hold-ups whatsoever. And I remember sitting with my back to the window, I sort of had one of my legs up on the seat. I was cleaning my sunglasses at the time. We're quite a superstitious team, the Sri Lankan team. Everyone had their same seat, and I always sat three seats back, because you got on the bus on the right-hand side, so I was left-hand side looking out of the coach. As I said, I had my back to the window and I was talking across the aisle to Trev. We'd started bowling the night before

and it was obviously it was a very flat pitch and we were going to have to work exceptionally hard to get our wickets. Third morning of the match just on our way to the ground and I'd had a bit of a headache to wake up with a bit of a headache that's morning so I was lying back on the seat with my eyes shut

and all of a sudden there was an explosion and far enough away from the bust of we knew it wasn't real close but it was close enough that sort of got your attention and within a few seconds there was a hand grenade or something went off next to the bus. The bus jolted and came to a stop pretty quickly and I just turned and looked over my shoulder,

looked out the window and could see this guy sort of moving towards us with a gun, firing this gun. And at no stage did I ever think he was shooting at us. I was convinced he was shooting at someone in front of us. I mean, you know, it was as much of a shock to see someone with a gun, let alone the thought that they might be actually shooting. There's a big roundabout just near the ground and there was a white vehicle reversing through the roundabout and pulled up in front of the bus and guys got out when we were shooting

at the police guys in the little van in front of us but you know there was other other guys waiting in the middle of the roundabout. And then the next thing the bus shook quite violently and then there was a couple of shouts of get down get down and I mean the Sri Lankan guys on the bus had seen bomb attacks and been aware of bomb attacks and probably were quicker to get to the floor than myself and maybe the three Australians that were on the bus. I was half asleep. So for the time I moved, everyone was on the floor in the middle of the bus, so I just

jumped down between the seats. I mean, there was nothing you could do as just, yeah, get low and, you know, head down, bum up. With the joel, I think I then got thrown to the floor rather than actually threw myself to the floor. And once I hit the floor, there was blood around me. There was quite a significant amount of blood. and I didn't know where it had come from until I realised that I had a piece of metal sticking out

of the top of my forearm and that Ajanthamendis who was in the seat in front of me had fallen onto the floor as well and the back of his head was bleeding quite significantly and at that stage the only thing that was going through my mind was you know please don't hit me again so I just crouched down between the two seats

with my head towards the outside of the bus and just I could sort of see back underneath between my legs and the guys lying down in the, I think it was Farby behind me and his arm was right there with the shrapnel sticking out of it with some of the blood trickling down his arm. It was an eerie calmness. As I say, you could hear this, you could hear pinging of which obviously were bullets hitting the bus, hitting the windows, glass, braking.

The calmness on the bus, I think, was one of the things that was sort of stood out to me. You know, there was hardly any noise. guys were very calm. The only thing that was being said on the bus was and no louder than this was oh I'm hit, oh so am I as the bullets were sort of flying through and a bit of shrapnel. So it was

the calmness was the thing that stood out for me. So it was one shout from the back of the bus which turned out to be Mahalo I think who had shouted that he'd been hit he was right in the back in the corner and there were stories that when he went off his seat a bullet went through the back of his seat and through the headrest of the seat in front.

Now, there was a lot of things that we learned after the event. Obviously, we weren't aware of at the time. The seat where Trevor had been sat, there were three bullet holes in the window where he'd got himself down and actually had the presence of mind to put his rucksack between him and the side of the bus at his computer in it, hoping that might give him a bit of protection.

Now, I didn't think as clearly as that, and I literally, as I said, I laid on the floor, apparently a grenade had gone off outside, and again, I didn't see that at the time, remember that's what injured a few of us was pieces of the bus that came in and, you know, it was shrapnel and pieces of metal in our body, to say, Jantha had probably somewhere in the region of 16 to 20 pieces of metal taken out of his head. And it was a strange feeling. The voice that I could hear was Dilshan's. Dilshan's got a very, a very obvious voice and very

distinctive. And I could hear him shouting to the bus driver to reverse. And the bus driver, and the the bus driver his seat was obviously very low down in front of these obviously great big windows at the front and then there were steps up to where we were all sat so Dilshan was at the front right behind the driver he always sat in the same place as I say a very superstitious group but he was the one popping his head up and giving the driver instructions of trying to reverse back

because the driver had sort of got himself under the steering wheel almost and steering with his arms above his head to try and keep himself out of the firing line literally and he managed to reverse the bus back and I could hear Dilshan shouting left, left, left, left and the guy was trying to steer left and get around the car to get away from, obviously, the attack. And it seemed like ages, but it probably was only seconds,

maybe a minute and a half, I don't know. But as I say, you know, the driver was given unbelievable amount of credit and for his skills to be able to get us out of that situation was incredible. There were still bullets flying through the bus at that stage and we took off. To this day, I always think that Dilshan saved our lives because I think Dilshan's bravery is sticking his head up and talking the driver through how to reverse and where to turn was probably our saving grace.

There is footage, I think, of someone took with a phone camera of the umpires, what little white van being shot out. I think they were right behind us. The match referee, Chris Broad and the umpire, You know, they were in a small minivan. We were actually in a, you know, a good-sized coach, and we were high up. And as I say, we had some sort of protection around us. They had literally nothing.

And their van driver was shot and killed. The fourth umpah, Hassan Roger, was shot in the back. The match referee was the former England batsman, Chris Broad, who was caught up in the shooting, but escaped unhurt. He's now left Pakistan and joins us live right now on Five Life Sport. Good evening to you, Chris. Yeah, hi, Mark. Tell us your story.

Well, initially, you know, there was, what I would describe was a popping sound. It didn't seem to me as though there was rifle fire, but the local umpire Sun Raza said to me, get on the floor, get on the floor. That's where we stayed for the next seven to ten minutes when everything went on around us. Our van was hit several times. You know, I can't remember how many times they were loud cracks. the bullets and the shrapnel hit the van, we were stuck there because the terrorists had killed our driver. There were five of us in the back of the van, all lying on the floor, listening to

the crack of bullets going on around us, as I say, hitting the van, and every time you heard a crack, you just thought, this bullet's for me. There was a lot of blood. It wasn't until we got to the stadium, it became apparent that on my side, so Ajanthamendis in front of me, myself, Paravitana was sat behind me. He had similar sort of shrapnel in his chest and had passed out. So his white training shirt was soaked in blood at the front. And the physio and the trainer, the two Australian fellas on the other side, the bus pulled him down because he passed out on his seat. So they actually got him by the legs and pulled him down onto the floor. And then behind them was Kumar, Sangakara and Tilan Samawira

and they were sat together and as Sangha had fallen to the floor Sammy fell on top of him so his backside was in the air and he was the only one who actually was hit by a bullet Samarawira who'd just made the I think he'd made a double hunter in that match he got hit by a bullet which went in his rump and it sat behind his knee

so he was the worst injured we got into the ground and we were taking into the change room they very quickly got medical people in to assess those that were injured you know there was obviously a lot of concern for Paravitana the fact that he had at the pier to have been shot in the chest and as it turned out it was shrapnel from the side of the bus Ajantha with his head mine obviously because you know mine at the time didn't look quite so bad

it was a piece of metal sticking out my arm you know and I was able to walk off the bus quite easily Sammy was obviously carried off by a couple of the lads and there was absolute panic then at the grand Once the bus got into the stadium, you can still hear gunfire going on at the roundabout, which wasn't that far away. And it was absolute pandemon. That's when, I think, panic and almost distress took over, I think, for everybody once we got in the changing room. Because you can still hear the gunfire.

There were medical people brought in. There was quite a lot of people coming in, officials, people that wanted to see what had gone on. that there was, it just seemed like lots and lots of people in there and the level of anger and distress I think amongst us as a team started to really hit home. You know, seeing people that were in our team laying on the physio beds, bleeding and obviously injured and in, you know, in distress, in pain. And I think then that's when we all sort of started to realise, you know,

quite how bad the situation was. There was a lot of emotion. I remember Dilshan kicking at the winter. when one official came in and started suggesting who was at fault for the attack and he was very quickly told to get himself out of our room. Yeah, some of the Pakistan authorities came in and said everything was okay. Well, quite clearly wasn't, so. Those of us who are injured, they tried to take us out to ambulances to take us to hospital.

And I flatly refused to go back out there. There was no way I was going by road anywhere. And I flatly refused and Ajantha are exactly the same. But Tillan and Para had to be taken by ambulance and they were taken off. And I, the one thing that I do have a sketchy memory of is the television's then being put on in the changing room and us all watching this drama unfold that we've been central part of. But it was like watching a film. It was very surreal watching this, the reporting of the attacks.

And unfortunately, they showed on the news a picture of this. ambulance which had been in our convoy which we all were led to believe was our the ambulance had taken our two injured players away with the doors all open and bullet holes in it and we thought they'd been attacked on their way to hospital which very quickly was proved that wasn't the case and it was the ambulance which was part of our convoy I left my bag on the on the bus so they didn't have a phone with me but the Aussie physio we had with us at the time Tommy simsac he had a phone so we were using that I'd rung my wife and she was just picking the kids up from school about three

o'clock in the afternoon in Australia and I mean luckily we did did speak to it because the reports I mean obviously with all the press and TV cameras at the ground it was reported fairly quickly in fact we were in the change room watching it unfold like on the on the TVs in the in the change room but it was reported back in Australia that the Sri Lankan coach had been shot because in Australia I mean a coach they call it a bus so it would have you know if it was the bus shot up it would have been bus but actually used the word coach had been shot so I had a few phone calls saying it was like I was

all right. Thankfully, I'd spoken to her before that, so she was able to reassure the friends that had rung that I was fine. The more time we spent the change, I think the more anger and upset and distress started to come through for everybody. They got two big Air Force Chinook helicopters land on the square to pick us up. We're in the change room, we're in the dressing room for just over five hours, I think. We didn't take off from the ground until about 2, 2.215. had about a 15-minute flight to an Air Force base. So we got into the helicopter, which landed on the square, and there was talk of a handheld rocket launcher being fired

and had gone over the top of the bus. And I didn't know that at the time, but my fear when we got in the helicopter was, did they have anything that could attack us when we got in, and if they were that keen to attack us outside the stadium with all that security around us, would they have a go when the helicopter took off from the stadium? And then we were driven out in Land Rover's in the dark to the airport.

A Sriankan airliner had flown in. The president had sent this airliner with medical people on. People from the cricket board had come as well. And we were being sort of treated, if you like, on the go, on the airplane on their way back to Colombo. Both the players that had gone to hospital joined us at the airport. And they were seats were being taken out of the airplane for them to have the trolleys put on. And we weren't going to fly without them. and we all agreed we would fly back with them

and got back into Colombo early hours of the morning. Half a dozen of us were taken straight from the airport to hospital and that's where, you know, most of us spent at least a week in there. It became a bit of a hub. And my room in particular, I had a spare, there were two beds in my hospital room and we were looked after exceptionally well at the hospital. And Ajanthi used to come and sit on the spare bed in my room

and a few of the younger lads who've been caught up in it, it became sort of a bit of a hub. And we used to sit in there for quite a long time chatting that I saw Jantamendis recently in Sri Lanka and he still laughs about the fact that there was something going on whilst we were in the hospital and a load of firecrackers went off outside the window. And he reckons that I got under the bed

because I was that nervous and it made him laugh and it was the first time that he'd laugh for a couple of days. my wrist was really swollen and it turned out when they opened me up I had about another six or seven pieces of metal embedded in my wrist and one piece that actually severed the muscle that runs through my forearm

which your first two fingers it runs up between there and has control of them so my index finger on my right hand was sort of flopped open and the muscle would be 95% severed so they were able to stitch that back up and then they left

left me with an open wound for two or three days and I had to go back in for another op and have it all cleaned up and stitch back up. So, you know, when you think back that how lucky we were on the bus, only Tilland was actually hit by a bullet and the other three of us, four of us with Mahela getting shrapnel in the ankle, the rest of us were very, very lucky. I mean, we were all incredibly lucky to have gone through that and there was criticism at the time of the police and the security around us that some of them took off, well, if you're on a motorbike

and there's two of you, and one of them's got a gun and he's been shot and he's laying in the road shot, I defy anyone not to get out of the way. I mean, that human nature takes over there and doesn't matter how highly trained you are. You know, I attach no blame whatsoever

to any of the security people around us. And, you know, my sadness about all of it is the fact that people died just helping us go and play a game of cricket. You know, that sadness, I think, will stay with me forever. Pakistan has been removed as a co-host for the 2011 Cricket World Cup following last month's terror attack on the Sri Lankan team in Lahore. The tournament will now be staged entirely in Bangladesh, India and...

I honestly hope, and I've always hoped, that international cricket will return to Pakistan, that the three visits I'd had there until that morning, thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it. It's a tough place to play cricket, but it's an unbelievably passionate, country for the game of cricket. And the sadness for me is that you've got players now playing international cricket for Pakistan and there will be players that will have played their entire career and never played a game in their own country.

I hope in the future it can do. There's a few games going back there. I think the more confidence, the more of those games that have played, the more confidence that players and teams from other parts of the world have got that everything is okay. It's a shame there's no cricket there. Some of the supporters in Pakistan some of the best in the world, you know, some of the most passionate supporters in the world.

So, you know, for them to be missing out on watching, you know, the best players in the world, international players and being able to support their own players, you know, even their own players when they play a home game, most of them are in the, you know, in the UAE. So, yeah, I think eventually from their point of view, hopefully, yeah, cricket does get back there. Now, having seen the positive effect that sport and cricket in particular has on people in the Asian colour, countries that play international cricket and the effect that it was having in Sri Lanka. Even during the Civil War, it brought people together. It gave them something to smile about when people were losing their life in bomb attacks and terrorist attacks.

The fact that cricket was being played in Sri Lanka and people still came to Sri Lanka. It is such a shame that international cricket isn't being played on a regular basis in Pakistan. As long as there is that security around the teams, you know, I think that as long as the players feel comfortable, comfortable with it. There's any reason why in the future we can't. It's probably a decision I'll never have to make finishing up with England in September. As I said, I think it'd be a shame if teams don't get back there in the future. I'd have no hesitation in going back to Pakistan if things were right to go and be part of cricket there. And I'd like to see cricket played in La Hague. And I think for me there's almost a bit of unfinished business

and for me to go back there and see international cricket played in Lahore well I think it would be for the people that lost their lives I think that would be for them to show that you know terrorism hasn't stopped the game of cricket going ahead and that even if it was only a small thing

for them to say that you know we've all made an effort to get back and continue to play cricket there I think would be a wonderful thing and at the moment you know it's great to see that there are steps being taken and teams and individuals have gone and I applaud them for that. I think it's fantastic that they have gone back there

and I really do hope that at some day it does return in its full sense there. I think the attack definitely had an effect on me and changed my thinking and change perhaps the way that I was certainly for a period. I think after a while you almost go back to normal if there is a normal.

I mean, for probably four months afterwards, I slept with the light on. I didn't like people walking behind me. I got quite panicky people walk behind me, which in a city like Colombo is not an easy thing to do because you keep stopping to let them go past. But I think you sort of, you do move back to some sort of normality,

but I don't think it's something you ever really completely. I mean, I'll never forget it. It's a situation that, and I've, I've obviously got a scar to stay with me forever, so, you know, I've only got to look at my arm or rub my arm sometimes and you feel the sky and think, oh yeah, cracky, and it comes back to you. I've never thought about it too much. I mean, yeah, I've no use thinking about it. I mean, it was over and done with and move on. To this day, I have no, I have no hatred or anger towards the people that carried it out. I just very sad for the people that lost their lives, but I have no anger.

I have no anger, I've no bitterness towards those people that carried it out. I mean I have no idea why they did it and probably never will know why they did it. But it, as I say, it's just a real deep sadness for the people that died.