London [UK], July 13 (ANI): England specialist bowling consultant Tim Southee took a jibe at India captain Shubman Gill following the dramatic scenes that transpired during the final moments of Day 3 of the third Test at Lord’s.
The element of spice, emotions boiling over, and tempers fraying entered the picture after India packed their bags on 387, the exact total as England. Openers Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett were tasked to see off the testing eight to ten minutes of the day.
Before the third delivery of pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah’s first over, Crawley moved out of the way twice, indicating that there was movement behind the bowler. Bumrah and Gill appeared to be unconvinced, feeling that the English opener was wasting time. Gill expressed his discontent and yelled at Crawley from the slip cordon.
On the fifth delivery, Crawley sustained a blow on the glove. He quickly removed the glove and asked the physio to have a look at it, which caused pandemonium on the field. The Indian players sarcastically clapped and swarmed the English openers as Gill and Crawley engaged in a heated verbal exchange while pointing fingers at each other.
Southee suggested Gill had no right to complain, considering he took a massage on the field on the second day of the Test and told reporters after the end of the day’s play, “It’s always exciting to see both sides animated towards the end. I don’t know what they (India) were complaining about when Shubman was lying down all the time, taking a massage in the middle of the day yesterday. It is obviously a part of the game.”
England successfully managed to eat up enough time to bring the day to a close unscathed, with the scoreboard reading 2/0. India’s experienced opener KL Rahul indicated that he understood England’s time-wasting ploy under the circumstances that they were stuck in.
“What happened at the end is, I mean, it’s just part of the game now. I mean, this is every, I understand from an opening batter’s point of view. I have, I can, I know exactly what is going on, and everyone knows exactly what is going on. But an opening batter will understand completely what happened in the last five minutes,” Rahul told reporters in a press conference.
Over the course of three days, 32 overs have been lost due to various reasons. Southee defended the slow-over rate and said, “It’s never ideal, I don’t think, but it’s obviously been hot so there’s been probably more drinks than usual. There’s been a number of stoppages with the ball also, and DRS takes its time. But yeah, to lose that much, it’s probably at the extreme level.” (ANI)