Tim Paine slams Indian cricketers for putting Test series at risk on 2020-21 tour of Australia, says 'I find that pretty..'

Source: Twitter

The India tour of Australia in 2020-21 was an epic one as this is the same Test series that saw the visitors make a remarkable comeback afetr being 0-1 down the four-match series. After being bundled out for 36 in the second innings of the first Test at Adelaide, India went on to win the series 2-1. The team was led by Ajinkya Rahane in the absence of Virat Kohli who had gone back home for the birth of his first child. The tour is known for India's strong mental strength as despite losing players throughout the series due to injuries, they kept bouncing back as replacement players stepped up and delivered on the big stage. 

Almost a year and a half later, a new documentary 'Bando Mein Tha Dum' has come out which narrates the story of India's historic turnaround in the series. In the documentary, one of the comments from the then Australian captain Tim Paine has caught the attention of the watchers, especially from India. Paine revists an episode from the tour, right after the Melbourne Test, the second of the series, that India had won. 

"Can't wait to get you to the Gabba"

"Can't wait to get you to India, it will be your last series"

Tim Paine v Ravichandran Ashwin.

Throwback to the famous verbal fight during the Australia-India test series, 2021.pic.twitter.com/y3EKafxRON — Cricketopia (@CricketopiaCom) June 15, 2022

In a video that had gone viral on internet, five Indian cricketers including Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill, Rishabh Pant, Prithvi Shaw, and Navdeep Saini were seen at a restaurant waiting for their food to arrive. That video did not go down well with the Aussie camp as roaming around like that was not allowed as Covid-19 was spreading at rapid pace in Sydney. The SCG Test was not far and after that video surfaced, these Indian cricketers were sent into quarantine and came out only after they tested negative. 

Speaking on the incident, Paine says that the 5 Indian cricketers had put the whole series on the line. "I mean those four or five guys put the whole Test series at risk. For what? For a bowl a Nando's chips or wherever they went, like I just find that pretty selfish to be honest," Paine said. 

The current Australian Test captain Pat Cummins said that the Aussies were annoyed by the act as some cricketers had to spend the christmas without their families and to see the other team flouting the rules and not taking the protocols seriously was a bit annoying.

However, Indian captain Ajinkya Rahane has explained in the documentary that Aussie cricketers reacting like that was nothing but mind games as they had been rattled by the loss in MCG Test a few days ago. "The players who appeared in the pictures were actually waiting for their takeaway order. Due to bad weather, they had to wait inside. The story that appeared in the news was really wrong. The Australian cricket board said that when you will go to Sydney from Melbourne, no one can come out of the hotel and you have to undergo quarantine. The outside world, especially in Sydney, everything was normal. There was no lockdown, everyone was allowed to move around and the players were asked to stay indoors. We knew that Australia have started to play mind games, especially after what happened in Melbourne," said Rahane.