DC coach Ricky Ponting breaks silence on Rishabh Pant-Pravin Amre no-ball row: Everything about it was wrong
India Today
Delhi Capitals (DC) got themselves in a major controversy during their match against the Rajasthan Royals (RR) on April 22.
Delhi Capitals (DC) head coach Ricky Ponting reckoned that his team’s outburst during the match against the Rajasthan Royals (RR) at the Wankhede Stadium was completely uncalled-for. On April 22, DC skipper Rishabh Pant and assistant coach Pravin Amre lost their composure after the on-field umpire didn’t adjudge Obed McCoy’s full toss as a waist-high no-ball.
Amre was also seen charging onto the field to have a heated discussion with the umpires, after which sanity prevailed. With 36 runs needed in the final over, Rovman Powell smashed McCoy for three sixes in a row to keep alive Delhi’s hopes of an unlikely triumph. But after the short break due to the controversy, Powell lost the plot and the Royals won by 15 runs.
Later, Pant was fined 100 percent of his match fees, while Amre was also meted out with the same punishment along with a one-match ban. Ponting clearly stated that his team isn’t proud of their actions by any stretch of the imagination.
“It was all wrong, everything about it was wrong. The umpire was wrong but you have got to get on with it. For our players to demonstrate what they did and to have our assistant coach run onto the field, it's not anything we are happy with or proud of. I have spoken to the guys about that,” Ponting was quoted as saying to Star Sports.
“But KP (Kevin Pietersen), we have had a pretty tough time at DC over the last few weeks. We have had Covid cases, we have been locked in the hotel room and, I think, just all the frustration that built up. It was a close game and it all just came out there in that moment.
“That was a lion in the sand moment for us, it was the halfway time of the tournament. We said we would leave all that behind and move to the 2nd half of the tournament with a better attitude,” he added.
Ponting wasn’t a part of the Capitals’ dugout in that game as he was serving a five-day isolation period after being deemed as one of the close contacts of his family member, who was tested positive for COVID-19.
