Lokesh Rahul’s sportsmanship: The Indian opening batsman didn’t claim a catch after the ball had hit the ground.
During the third day of the fourth Test of the ongoing India’s tour of Australia at Sydney, India opening batsman Lokesh Rahul put on display a perfect act of sportsmanship after he didn’t claim a grounded catch on the bowling of India all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja.
Rahul’s act saw him earning praise from umpire Ian Gould. While most players tend to be unsure of whether the ball had hit the ground or not in such situations, Rahul clearly signaled it to the umpire despite his teammates having started to celebrate.
It all happened on the first delivery of the 15th over when Australia opening batsman Marcus Harris stepped out to hit Jadeja over mid-on. With minimal timing on the shot, Harris hit the ball just ahead of Rahul, who was fielding at mid-on.
With the ball dying at him, Rahul tried his best with his attempt of diving forward but couldn’t affect the dismissal. Having watched the proceedings, umpire Ian Gould was seen appreciating Rahul not claiming the catch.
Watch the full video below:
A good effort from Rahul and he immediately says it bounced. Great stuff. Umpire Gould a big fan of it #CloseMatters#AUSvIND | @GilletteAU pic.twitter.com/7nA0H5Lsc7
— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) January 4, 2019
The Australian openers stitched a 72-run partnership before Usman Khawaja (27) was dismissed by Kuldeep Yadav. Australia lost wickets at regular intervals since then to be reduced to 236-6 in 83.3 overs at Stumps. With the hosts still 386 runs behind the Indian total, saving the match seems to be an onerous task for them.
Rahul might not be having the best day of his career with the bat, but this act of his gained plentiful approbation on social media platform Twitter. Read some of the latest Twitter reactions on the same below:
Great sportsmanship 👏🏻
— ✪ Pokey 🇦🇺 (@xPokeyyy) January 4, 2019
Great Sportsmanship exhibited by KL Rahul. The Indian team has played cricket in this entire series with the right spirit. Winning hearts and fans across ! #CloseMatters #AUSvIND
— Vagabond 🇮🇳 (@mitzone) January 5, 2019
That’s probably the only good thing KL Rahul has done on this whole tour so far😁.Well played 👏
— कु.दिनेश शिवाजी मासाळ (@dineshmasal03) January 5, 2019
Obviously pleased (& not surprised) to see Rahul do the right thing. However, the norm and expectation of players on catches should be honesty. Instead of heaping great praise on players for honesty, we should be severely condemning and calling out those who wrongly claim catches
— Rocky Perrotta (@rockyperrotta) January 5, 2019
Brilliant stuff @klrahul11 and great gesture from Unpire Gouldie !!
— Subbu (@subbaraman_k) January 5, 2019
