MELBOURNE: Australian opener David Warner has been fined 50 per cent of his match fee for a verbal spat with Indian batsman Rohit Sharma during an ODI tri-series cricket match here but defended himself by insisting that he was merely asking his rival to “speak English”.
Warner revealed that he has been fined during a radio interview after yesterday’s match which Australia won by four wickets.
The swashbuckling opener said although getting involved in the altercation was not right but maintained that he did nothing wrong by asking Rohit to speak in English.
The showdown took place at the end of the 23rd over of India’s innings when Rohit charged for a single on an overthrow, much to the displeasure of the Australians.
“On the cricket etiquette side of things when you throw a ball to the keeper and it hits a player you don’t run,” Warner said on ‘Sky Sports Radio’.
“A few of the boys said something to him and when I went over to say something he sort of said something in their language and I said ‘speak English’, because if you’re going to say something for me to understand theoretically, I cannot speak Hindi.
“So I did the polite thing and asked him to speak English, therefore he did, and I can’t repeat what he said. I thought I was okay by asking him to speak English and I’m going to say it a couple of times if he keeps saying it in Hindi. I got slapped on the wrist yesterday by the ICC, I shouldn’t have engaged him and should have went to the other side to my fielding position, but I didn’t,” he recalled.
Warner said Rohit should have desisted from taking the single as the ball had ricocheted off his legs.
“The guys behind the wicket said it hit him. I walked in because I presumed it hit him as well. I was in the wrong.
What he was saying to me I asked him to speak English,” he said. . “I got in trouble for engaging the player, which technically you’re not allowed to do that now … You’re not supposed to walk at the player. It was between overs and I should have walked around to my fielding position,” Warner said.
The Aussies were also guilty of being slow with their over-rate which resulted in a shorter mid-innings break.
“If he (Australian captain George Bailey) … gets banned for a game, the coach will be very, very unimpressed,” Warner said.
“Some of us dawdled between overs here and there. Yeah you do get some credit with time noted about MS Dhoni taking his shoe off. The umpires go through that with a fine toothed comb and they’ve still done us.
“We’ve got to be better than that. No way in the world should a guy who’s captaining his country be suspended for a game. It’s our fault.” –PTI
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