‘With all abuse I got…’: Sam Billings, Aakash Chopra in Twitter debate over Jos Buttler-Matthew Wade incident
Former India cricketer Aakash Chopra took a dig at England cricketers over their silence on Matthew Wade trying to obstruct Mark Wood's fielding effort and seemingly questioned their double standards.
The 'Spirit of cricket' debate has been hogging the limelight ever since India's woman cricketer Deepti Sharma ran out England batter Charlie Dean when she had stepped out of the non-striker's crease before the ball was bowled. Dean's run out had won the match for India and ensured a 3-0 clean sweep over hosts England. Although it was a legal dismissal, the incident had sparked a controversy as several English cricket enthusiasts and current players had jumped in to ostracize and flay the Indian Women's Team over their tactics.
The moment that debate seemed to be fading away, it received a fresh fuel thanks to another incident, albeit of different kind, in the 1st T20I between Australia vs England in Perth on Sunday. The theme of 'spirit of cricket' was in question again as Australia batter Matthew Wade seemingly tried to obstruct England bowler Mark Wood from catching the ball after it had lobbed straight up when the left-hander tried to pull a short of length delivery off the England pacer. But interestingly or rather dramatically, captain Jos Butler didn't appeal to the umpires for Wade's dismissal on the grounds of obstructing the field.
Former India cricketer Aakash Chopra took a dig at England cricketers over their silence on Wade-Wood episode and seemingly questioned their double standards.
"Are our English friends (the custodians of the Spirit of the Game) quiet on this?," Chopra posted on Twitter.
Miffed by Chopra's tweet, Billings made a reference to the Deepti-Dean experience and replied "Nope. Pretty obvious. But with all the abuse I got previously… so I didn’t want to tweet again…"
Sam Billings was quite vocal in criticising India's Deepti Sharma on the run out incident. Billings had flayed Team India and Deepti in a thread on Twitter.
England captain Jos Buttler one being questioned about his not to appeal, said: “I was looking at the ball the whole time, so I wasn’t sure what happened. They asked if I wanted to appeal, but I thought we are here for a long time in Australia so would be a risky one to go for so early in the trip,” Buttler explained.
When poked further whether he would have appealed if it was a World Cup match, Buttler said “Maybe, yeah.”