ICC World Cup 2023: Pakistan squad hit by viral infection, several players reported ill

Further bad news is coming for Pakistan since their humiliating defeat to India in their latest ICC World Cup 2023 match as multiple players have been reported down with viral infection in Bengaluru, as per cricket website Wisden.

Pakistan are due to play Australia in three days' time (October 20) against Australia at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium but are unlikely to suffer before the first ball of the match as most of the squad is either reported unaffected or now recovered.

At the moment, two of the players are sick and one of them is down with fever, the report further stated. "Some players got fever in the past few days and most of them have fully recovered from it," Pakistan media manager Ahsan Nagi told Wisden. "Those who are in the stage of recovery remain under the team medical panel's observation. Pakistan will train at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium today from 6-8pm."

The Pakistan team, who won their first two matches before going down to India in Ahmedabad on October 14, were out for a dinner in Bengaluru on Monday night, and was their first public appearance together since the morale-sapping defeat.

Pakistan won their first match of the ICC World Cup 2023 against Netherlands followed by WC's record chase of 345 runs against Sri Lanka in Hyderabad. The team enjoyed strong support from the Hyderabad crowd as centurion Mohammad Rizwan remarked it felt like playing in Karachi.

The team would be hoping that the recovery is soon complete and that all players are fit and available for the Australia game on October 20 in Bengaluru. Currently, they are sitting on the fourth spot at the World Cup points table with four points from three games.

Meanwhile, a strange piece of news also made rounds of social media on Monday as a Pakistan journalist made a bizarre claim that BCCI hired a shaman or an Indian tantrik to do black magic on the Pakistan team. She also blamed it as the reason behind Pakistan's batting collapse against India as they went from 155/2 to 191 all out.