British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s trip to the U.S. this week got off to an inauspicious start after he passed up the chance to throw the first pitch at a baseball game on Wednesday. Reports in the lead up to Sunak’s appearance at Nationals Park suggested that Downing Street staffers had been nervous about the offer despite Sunak’s presumably somewhat transferable cricket skills. As it transpired, a British Army veteran threw the first pitch instead. The Times reported that No. 10 “denied suggestions that [Sunak] had chickened out,” while the former chairman of Sunak’s own Conservative Party alleged the prime minister had “bottled it.” “I bet you he bottled it,” Sir Jake Berry told Talk TV, according to The Telegraph. “Political stunts often go wrong, this is one that would be bound to go wrong.” Speaking to reporters on his flight to the U.S., Sunak insisted: “I wasn’t actually meant to ever do it.”