Former Australian opener Mark Waugh and veteran India keeper-batter Dinesh Karthik got into a fiery banter on day three of the recently concluded second Test between India and Australia in Delhi, which led to Waugh getting frustrated by Karthik and telling him off.
Waugh and Karthik, who had a go at each other, albeit in jest – during the 1st Test in Nagpur over a prediction made by DK, were in the middle of a discussion when Mark got suddenly outraged and took it out on his Indian counterpart.
While India was chasing 115 runs target to win, and were 31/1, Mark Waugh was displeased at the field setting by Australia captain Pat Cummins against veteran Cheteshwar Pujara who was playing his 100th Test match.
Distressed by Australia's capitulation with the bat, which saw them go from 61/1 to 113 all out, Waugh was dissecting captain Pat Cummins' ploy.
"I'm astounded at this field, honestly. I cannot believe you would not have a silly mid-off. You've got 100-something runs on the board, you've got Pujara who is struggling for runs, he does pad the ball away a lot on the off side. Surely you can have a bat pad off side," Waugh said on air on Star Sports.
This led to Dinesh Karthik engaging Waugh in a series of questions and answers, by the end of which, the former Australian cricketer ended up snapping at the Indian player and shutting him down.
Here is the entire conversation that took place:
Karthik: "I know you're not happy with the fieldset, let's go – what are you talking about?"
Waugh: "I want a bat-pad off-side and I want my point up and sort of a coaching cover, that can stay there, that would be a reasonable field."
As the next shot from Pujara went through point, Waugh kind of was irate.
Karthik: "Mark, if you had the point up that ball probably would have gone to the boundary.”
Waugh: "If you had point up, it would have gone straight to him in the circle.”
Karthik: "You don't think he would have found the gap on that one? He had time.”
Waugh: "We obviously think different but if I'm playing against Pujara, I want a bat-pad off-side because I think he's a big chance of squeezing one out there.”
Karthik: "But there's not for Rohit Sharma, not talking about that?”
Waugh: "We're not talking about Rohit Sharma. he's a completely different player DK.”
Karthik: "So you're happy with the field? There's nobody for Rohit Sharma, you're okay with that? You'd do the same as a captain?”
Waugh: "I didn't know this was a press conference.”
Karthik: "It's a bit of banter.”
Waugh: "I'm going to limit your questions per session, you're going to get one question, right? No more."
This led to fellow commentator Sanjay Manjrekar intervening and cooling things off by saying: “Ok, I'm going to step in here and read out the score.”
Karthik had also ruffled Mark Waugh’s feathers during the first Test in Nagpur by predicting that India will need to bat only once, which turned out to be true.
(Hindustan Times inputs)
