NEWS
Follow UsSam Konstas is not even out of his teens yet, and his on-field behaviour has already divided opinions amongst experts and ex-cricketers.
While one faction, especially coming from his teammates and coach, is labelling his aggression and the always-in-the-face-of-the-opposition attitude shown during the Sydney Test as youthful enthusiasm, others are not so happy about him riling up the opposition with his words.
Former Australian cricketer and broadcaster Mark Waugh questioned Konstas’s ‘naive enthusiasm’, which, according to him, could have landed Australia in trouble.
Two balls before the close of play on day one, Konstas got into a somewhat heated argument with Jasprit Bumrah after the India skipper asked Usman Khawaja to not waste time. Bumrah eventually got Khawaja on the final ball of the day, and, after that, the entire Indian side ran towards Konstas and celebrated aggressively. Bumrah did not celebrate but ran towards the youngster and gave him a death stare.
“You can understand Usman Khawaja trying to wind the clock down so he didn’t have to face another over, but then you have got Sam Konstas trying to get involved,” Waugh said.
“I don’t know whether it is naive enthusiasm or that’s just the way he has always played his game through the juniors and likes to have high energy and get involved in the game, but really there was no need for Sam to get involved there.”
Waugh advised the youngster to exercise restraint as it might have not only broken Khawaja’s concentration but also aggravated Bumrah, who is the number-one bowler in the world currently.
“I think he should have bit his tongue and it’s got nothing to do with him actually and it might have broken the concentration of Khawaja,” Waugh advised.
“If he keeps behaving like that he is going to have a target on his back for his whole career. I just think he is firing the opposition up. He’s fired up Jasprit. You don’t want to fire him up.
“I think Sam will reflect on that and think he should have minded his own business and say, I have just got to let the bat do the talking.”
Meanwhile, when asked about the incident in the press conference, Indian pacer Prasidh Krishna’s response to the situation was quite interesting.
The tall Karnataka pacer applauded the youngsters cheekily and acknowledged that it’s fun playing aggressive cricket with a character like that.
“I don’t think so [if Konstas got under the skin of the Indian team], but not yet, I mean. We enjoy the way he plays the game and we also would like to play the game aggressively,” Krishna answered with a smile after day two.
“If we have somebody that comes up and say ‘I can fight you’, as a team we want to tell them that you can’t take us for granted. We are here, 11 of us vs you. If you can be as aggressive, it’s fine.”
