An edited image of Australian cricketer Travis Head claiming that he "cheated" while catching the ball during the final match of the 2023 ICC Men's Cricket World Cup went viral on the internet.
Following this, a set of videos showing Indian cricketers namely, captain Rohit Sharma, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Irfan Pathan, reacting to this viral image are going viral too.
An archive can be seen here.
(Source: Facebook/Screenshot)
What's the truth?: These videos are old and edited.
They are unrelated to the 2023 ICC Men's Cricket World Cup.
Dhoni's video is from 2019, Virat's video is from an online interview from 2020, Pathan's remarks were for Sachin Tendulkar and Sharma's clip is from his Instagram live from 2020.
How did we find out the truth?: We performed reverse image search on some of the keyframes of these video which led us to old posts.
DHONI'S VIDEO
We performed relevant keyword search along with the reverse image search and came across news reports carrying this video.
An article shared by The Indian Express on 7 August 2019 states that this video was shared by Dhoni for students who were prepping for their exams.
The clip shows Dhoni motivating the students about achieving good results and working hard.
KOHLI'S VIDEO
PATHAN'S VIDEO
We also found Pathan's video on his Instagram account which was shared on 24 April.
In the viral video, Pathan talks about dreams, responsibilities, and stubbornness in achieving his goals.
In the original video, he continues to add that he wrote these lines for Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar.
SHARMA'S VIDEO
The reverse image search led us to a YouTube video of Instagram live stream of Sharma with Indian cricketer Suresh Raina.
The video was shared by Sportskeeda Cricket on 12 May 2020.
It shows Sharma talking about World Cup matches in general.
More context about Head's edited image: All these viral videos carry an edited image of Head to claim that he 'cheated' during the final match and was unable to catch the ball which dismissed Sharma.
The original photo shows that Head dove to catch the ball before it hit the ground, taking Sharma's wicket.
We debunked this viral claim and you can read out story here.
Conclusion: Old videos have been clipped and given a false context about Indian cricketers reacting to Travis Head's 'failed' catch in the ICC 2023 Men's World Cup final.
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