Mohammed Siraj landed in trouble when he was fined 20 percent of his match fee and earned a demerit point for his send-off to Travis Head during the second Test between India and Australia in Adelaide. Siraj was in overdrive throughout the pink-ball Test, showing a bit too much aggression, and it peaked when the India pacer gestured angrily after dismissing Head for 140. The incident snowballed further before the two called a truce and let bygones be bygones.
However, Siraj first lost his cool a day before when Marnus Labuschagne pulled out at the last minute, forcing the pacer to stop in his delivery stride. A seething Siraj threw the ball back in anger as Labuschagne explained the reason. Just behind the sight screen, a man with a ‘beer snake’ was walking by, forcing Marnus to withdraw just before Siraj was about to release the ball. As it turns out, Lachie Burtt, 21, responsible for the distraction, had put in a lot of effort to make the snake, collecting 250 empty cups and spending a whopping 2750 Australian dollars, which converts to INR 2.33 lakh.
Burtt was in attendance with seven friends, who put in hours of effort to get the snake going. The beer available – Hahn – cost 11 dollars each, making the prank an expensive affair. The ‘beer-snake’ is very common during cricket matches in Australia.
“The funny thing was everyone could buy four drinks [at one time], so we were all sitting there with four drinks each and there was 67 of us. So there was a fair bit going on… plus everyone around us on the hill, they were loving it,” NewsCorp quoted an engineer present at the venue as saying.
Burtt issues apology, Labuschagne responds
Burtt was quick to apologise for his actions, mostly to Labuschagne. “I didn’t really have time to stop and think what I was doing right now and what the effects were going to be because of it. I did feel a bit silly, it wasn’t the right thing … sorry Marnus,” he told 9News.
“It’s probably not the right thing to do, but no one got hurt. I didn’t jump the fence or anything. It was one ball, and Marnus (Labuschagne) got a four after that, so no worries. In my head at that time, I just wanted to get away from the guard, so I saw the space and hopped over the tiny white rope.”
