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Former India captain Sunil Gavaskar said that the incident of not shaking hands between Virat Kohli and Travis Head cannot be compared to the time when he himself walked off the field against Australia.
After Friday’s clash between Royal Challengers Bangalore and Sunrisers Hyderabad, Kohli and Head did not shake hands due to an on-field argument between the two at the start of the game.
Virat Kohli and Travis Head incident
Kohli and Head were seen attacking each other during RCB’s chase of 255 on Friday. Head reportedly had some choice words to say about Kohli’s batting and also made some comments about Venkatesh Iyer’s batting. Kohli was also seen taunting the impact player for bowling at the head.
When Kohli was out, Head allegedly said something like this that Kohli was out even before bowling. After the match, Kohli shook hands with the rest of the SRH team, but deliberately and dramatically ignored Head. No sanctions have been imposed against any party yet.
Sunil Gavaskar incident
The Gavaskar incident occurred in 1981 during a Test match between India and Australia at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
During India’s second innings, Gavaskar was batting on 70 when he was given out LBW off the bowling of Dennis Lillee, breaking India’s opening partnership of 165 runs.
Gavaskar, who was India’s captain at the time, was so enraged by the decision that he walked off the field and called his opening partner Chetan Chauhan along with him. India’s team manager stopped Chauhan and requested him to return.
Chauhan returned to the field and scored 85 before taking the second of Lillee’s four wickets in the innings. In the fourth innings, Kapil Dev took a brilliant five-for and India defended a very low target of 143.
That win helped India level the three-match series 1-1. This was the first time that India had come back from Australia without losing a Test series. The video of the incident has been shared and reshared many times on social media.
Anyone can take a picture – Sunil Gavaskar
Sunil Gavaskar sat down with former Australia captain Allan Border on the Midwicket Stories talk show and revisited the incident. Border played that Test in 1981, but was not captain. Gavaskar weighed the two incidents against each other and said, “Nothing like this happened, there can be no comparison. You have to ask both of them what happened.”
“In the heat of the moment, things happen; anyone can snap. During our time, there were no stump mics, so nothing went out. But with the stump mic, you can hear what’s happening. At the end of the day, when you play for your country, you give almost everything, blood, sweat, toil and tears,” Sunil Gavaskar further said.
Sunil Gavaskar said, “Everything goes into the public domain very quickly… The clip you saw from 1981, there are videos of the 1981 incident, but the two people in AB and I are talking about it, this is probably the first time people know what happened, that’s why it took so long.” “But now thanks to social media, it’s probably much more immediate how this will come about.”
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