David Warner has been blasted by former Indian opener Gautam Gambhir after hitting a ball that bounced twice for six during the T20 World Cup semi-final.
Warner continued his hot run of form against Pakistan, slamming 49 off just 30 deliveries before Matthew Wade guided Australia home in the dying overs.
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However, it was an incident that occurred early in Australia’s innings that caught the attention of Gambhir, a World Cup winner with India back in 2011.
With Warner off to a flying start, Pakistan captain Babar Azam opted to bring veteran spinner Mohammad Hafeez into the attack to stem the opener’s flow of runs, but the 41-year-old’s first ball was a woeful delivery that stuck in his hand and bounced twice before arriving slowly at the striker’s end.
Rather than letting the ball slide past him as a leg-side wide, Warner charged down the pitch and smacked it into the stands for six, with umpire Richard Kettleborough also ruling the ball as a no-ball, giving the Aussies a free hit the next ball.
Gambhir was livid with Warner’s decision to hit the ball for six, calling it “shameful”.
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“What an absolutely pathetic display of spirit of the game by Warner!” he tweeted, before tagging controversial former teammate Ravichandran Ashwin to ask for another opinion.
Gambhir also challenged outspoken former Australian players such as Shane Warne to call out Warner’s act.
https://twitter.com/GautamGambhir/status/1458865037351682051
“Ricky Ponting talks about spirit of the game, Shane Warne tweets on everything,” he said.
“Now what will they say on Warner incident? When Ashwin Mankad we see big comments. Where’s Warne now? It’s easy to talk about other players, but difficult for your own players”.
READ MORE: Pakistan ‘warrior’ lauded for courageous act
Although his opinion wasn’t as strong as Gambhir’s, former Australian international Brad Hodge also questioned Warner’s decision to dispatch the ball.
“It’s a funny one isn’t it because there’s a line in sport of what is fair and what is unreasonable in sporting conduct,” he told SEN.
“I don’t know, he’d probably like to take that one back, I’d suppose. Usually this doesn’t happen.
“We don’t see it too often so when it does happen [hitting it for six] is probably not in the behaviour of the sport, but it’s fair enough, it’s a legal delivery so go for your life.”
Despite the criticism levelled at Warner after the match, none came from the two commentators in the box when the incident occurred.
“I think the ball got stuck in his hand, so it bounced a couple of times and was enough for Warner to line it up,” Indian great Sunil Gavaskar said.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen that before, a double-bouncer hit for six,” Gavaskar’s co-commentator Mark Nicholas added.