Cape Town, Aug 9 (ANI): Talking about his restricted vision and adjusted life since his freak eye accident life, veteran Proteas wicketkeeper Mark Boucher has admitted that it is like looking at the world through a toilet roll.
At a poignant, packed press conference at Newlands, Boucher in his first public appearance since his freak, international career-ending injury to his left eye at Taunton in England almost a month ago, admitted that his illustrious playing time at all levels is all but over.
Boucher, 36, lost the lens, iris and pupil in that eye and had two major operations and four blood-draining procedures in the past three weeks, although there remains cause for optimism that he will regain some vision in it.
"Physically, at times, I have been in a lot of pain," he said in a prepared statement, which he read largely without faltering before questions were invited from journalists. I find any amount of sunlight very harsh and have thus been restricted to the confines of my home," Sport24 quoted him, as saying.
Later asked about his day-to-day life at present, he said: "After the (first) operation the headaches were quite bad. Sleeping at night ... I was told initially to sleep on one side, which can get really irritating. You lose a lot of depth (of vision) ... you go to shake a person's hand and you end up shaking before the hands (meet), which is, well, different.
"It's a bit like looking at the world through a toilet roll or something like that. I haven't really felt up to doing anything. It's been different. But people go through these things, you get over it, and I'll lick my wounds and move on."
Boucher also said that he had since watched "pretty much every ball" of the ongoing Test series against England on television, and paid tribute to the way AB de Villiers has adapted to the void behind the stumps. (ANI)