New Delhi: Indian Women’s team captain Harmanpreet Kaur made headlines for her aggressive remarks against umpire’s decision in the 3rd and final One Day International (ODI) tournament.
As per the information, the Indian team captain may have to face 75% fine on her match fee and 3 demerit points of the game she played against the Bangladesh Women at the Sher-e-Bangla Stadium on Saturday.
Harmanpreet Kaur anger rant over poor umpiring
The 34-year-old batter smashed the stumps and exchanged some hate arguments with the match official Tanvir Ahmed. At the post-match conference, she also lashed out at Bangladesh captain Nigar Sultana Jyoti.
During the match, Indian captain Harmanpreet Kaur also reprimanded the umpire following her dismissal. On the fourth delivery of 34 overs, Harmanpreet was caught by Fatima Khatun and sent off by Nahida Akhter.
Kaur hit stumps
In a response to her LPW, Harmanpreet slapped the stump with her bat and uttered cuss words to the match official as she walked away. She even gave the celebrating crowd her thumbs up. As her ball nearly hit the glove, Harmanpreet began to swing and was caught slipping. However, the image was not visible.
IND-W captain Harmanpreet hit the stumps, shouts at the umpire then showed middle finger & thumb to the fans after given LBW by the umpire, claiming it was bat.
She Also Complaint about Umpiring In Press Conference #HarmanpreetKaur #INDWvsBANW pic.twitter.com/4HY8nWff8x— Saqlain (@SaqlainHameeed) July 22, 2023
Smriti Mandhana comes to her defense
“What do you think?” Mandhana countered when asked about the umpire. “With any game, there are times when the nature of the game just isn’t satisfying… especially when he doesn’t have DRS in this series,” Mandhana said.
“We’re hoping for a little better level. For some decisions, it was clear that they didn’t even think about whether the ball hit the field or not, so for some decisions, I’d better call it a better level referee. It didn’t even occur to me for a second, and my fingers went up,” Mandana tempered his anger with a more balanced response.
Mandhana hoped neutral umpiring would be the way forward. “I’m sure the ICC, BCB and BCCI will definitely have a discussion on this subject. Perhaps we have a neutral refereeing system so we won’t sit here and have this discussion. Perhaps we can focus on cricket and cricket-related issues,” she said.
She spoke about Kaur’s behavior contradicting ‘the Spirit of Cricket’, which she said she would discuss another day.
“What happened in midfield is an integral part of the game. We have seen many such incidents in the past in men’s cricket,” Mandhana said in her defense.
“When you play for India, you want to win games,” she said. It’s hot right now, but I don’t think she was really happy with this decision [against her opponent]. It was published, but it felt like it didn’t exist out there,” she added.
“If you really want to win, I’m sure you can talk about the spirit of the game and all that stuff later. But knowing who Harman is and how much she wants to win for India, it’s wrong in the spirit of the game (from a point of view), but if you really want the ‘W’ on the board for India, things like that happen,” added Mandhana.
