‘It’s up to the match referee’ – Andrew McDonald weighs in on heated altercation involving Sam Konstas and Indian team

Jasprit Bumrah and Sam Konstas.
(Photo by Morgan Hancock – CA/Cricket Australia via Getty Images)

The 19-year-old Australian top-order batter, Sam Konstas, was in the midst of a heated exchange ahead of the final delivery of Day 1 of the fifth Test between Australia and India.

Head coach Andrew McDonald had a say on the incident and conveyed that it was up to the higher officials to take a call on the same.

“Considering there have been no charges on the Indian team, clearly it’s acceptable behaviour because there were no fines or punishments. It’s up to the match referee, if this is acceptable behaviour or not. My conversation with Sam was about checking in with him. Clearly the Indian celebration was intimidating, with all of them swarming in. So, just wanted to make sure he’s okay,” stated McDonald, as quoted by The Indian Express.

For the unversed, Konstas was at the non-striker’s end for the last ball of the day. Usman Khawaja, at the striker’s end, according to the Indian team, was taking unneccessarily long to mark his guard for the delivery to follow. After Bumrah expressed his discontent, Konstas made sure to voice out a few words to Bumrah, something he did not take too kindly. Upon claiming Khawaja’s wicket, Bumrah semi-charged towards Konstas while the entire slip cordon and the team swarmed around Konstas to celebrate the dismissal.

Interestingly, this is not the first time Konstas has been in the midst of a passionate exchange. A recent occurrence was when he was shouldered by Virat Kohli on his Test debut at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

India finish Day 2 with 145-run lead

After cleaning up Australia for 181 courtesy of an all-round performance by the Indian bowling unit, the visitors ended the day on 141 for the loss of six wickets. Rishabh Pant’s 61-run blitz provided adequate momentum to an innings which never really got going.

Also Read: Twitter Reactions: Australia pull back strings on Day 2 of Sydney Test as India’s batting woes continue

India would be aiming to add as many to the total before focusing on how they could attain victory to level the series.

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