Indian cricket team’s wicketkeeper-batter, Rishabh Pant, weighed in on the heated discussions between pacer Jasprit Bumrah and Australian opener Sam Konstas on Day 1 of the fifth Test match in Sydney. Both cricketers were indulged in the heated argument that led to the final moments of the day, but the last laugh came for the pacer from India as he dismissed Usman Khawaja on the very next delivery. Pant said he did not hear much about what exactly was said by Konstas to Bumrah. However, he said that the Australian youngster wanted to waste time from getting India to bowl another over on the day at the must-win match.
“I feel they had a little chitchat; waste some time. I feel that’s the reason Konstas had a conversation with Jasprit Bumrah. He said something; I didn’t hear it. But I feel that’s the only thing which he wanted to do—waste some time so we don’t get to bowl one more over,” Pant told reporters.
Meanwhile, former India opener Navjot Singh Sidhu found Rohit Sharma’s decision to “opt out” of the currently ongoing fifth Test against Australia as “bizarre” with the wrong signals that it would send and deserved “more respect” from the team management to the regular captain.
Poor form and Rohit “opted to rest” from the Sydney Test, handing over duties as captain to Jasprit Bumrah. This paved the way for entry of Shubman Gill into this important match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
“A Captain should never be dropped midstream nor given the option to opt out … sends wrong signals,” Sidhu wrote in a post shared on ‘X.
Rohit sharma missed out on the first Test in Perth for the birth of his second child. He is now standing having scored only 31 runs in five innings, across three Tests.
“Have seen Captains like Mark Taylor, Azharuddin etc persisted as captain for a year despite bad form … @ImRo45 deserved more respect and faith from the management .. Bizarre coz it happened for the first time in the history of Indian cricket …. Blunder – for a fallen lighthouse is more dangerous than a reef!,” he added.
