"Crammed Into Vans": Delhi Capitals Star's Wife Recalls Terrifying Scenes From Dharamsala

The Indian Premier League (IPL) is set to resume on Saturday, days after it was suspended owing to geopolitical tensions between India and Pakistan. The match between Punjab Kings (PBKS) and Delhi Capitals (DC) was called off owing to security reasons, although the BCCI had cited floodlights failure as the reason behind the suspension of the match. Since Dharamsala isn’t too far from the border, a special train was organised to get the players to New Delhi.

After reaching the National Capital, the Indian players left for their respective cities while the overseas stars flew back to their countries, hours before India and Pakistan agreed on a ceasefire.

Australia Women’s team captain Alyssa Healy, who was in Dharamsala to support his husband Mitchell Starc and DC, has recalled the scenes from that horrific night in Dharamsala.

“It was a surreal experience. All of a sudden a couple of the light towers went out and we were just sitting there up the top waiting… we’re a large group of family and extra support staff and the next minute the guy who wrangles the group of us and gets us on the bus came up and his face was white,” Healy said on The Willow Talk Podcast.

Healy revealed that Faf du Plessis wasn’t even wearing his shoes when she reached the dressing room, where Starc informed her that a nearby town had been hit by a missile.

“He was like, ‘we need to go right now’. Then another guy came out and his face was white and he grabbed one of the children and said, ‘we need to leave right now’. We were like, ‘what’s going on?’ We weren’t told anything. We had no idea. Next minute we are being shuffled into this room which was like a holding pen. All the boys were in there. Faf du Plessis didn’t even have shoes on. We were all just waiting there, looking stressed. I said to Mitch, ‘what’s going on?’ He said the town 60km away had just been smacked by some of the missiles so there was a complete blackout in the area. That’s why the lights were off because the Dharamsala stadium was like a beacon at that point in time. All of a sudden we’re crammed into vans and off we go back to the hotel. There was madness,” she added.

Healy also recalled that the scenes near the border were similar to a gaming warzone.

“We ended up going southwest towards the (Pakistan) border, which was a little bit terrifying. Mitch and I have played too much Call of Duty and we’re noticing all surface-to-missile sites that were just sitting there ready to go. They’re radar-operated systems that shoot missiles at aircraft. We saw a few of them on the way through in some small towns. Some peanut down in the village decides it’s a great idea to set off some fireworks in the middle of the day. I think everyone at lunch froze, turned around and was like, ‘oh my God!’ And then I could pinpoint, I could see the fireworks going up. I hope it was a wedding and I hope they have a beautiful marriage but that was just not good timing. There was anxiety and terrified at the same time, but I still feel like we would have been OK. We weren’t right in the firing line,” she further revealed.