"If I had not sent him off the field, he could have been banned for next four matches" - Ajinkya Rahane recalls incident involving Yashasvi Jaiswal
Veteran batter Ajinkya Rahane recalled the infamous incident where he decided to send Yashasvi Jaiswal, his own teammate, off the field during the 2022 Duleep Trophy Final. Leading the West Zone against the South Zone in Coimbatore, Rahane was forced to take an unorthodox course of action after the youngster was involved in a war of words with the opposition.
Fielding at forward short-leg, Jaiswal constantly chirped away to South Zone's Ravi Teja, and things escalated inevitably. The on-field officials did not receive the repeated sledging well as Jaiswal refused to back down despite multiple warnings. As a last resort, Rahane had a chat with the youngster and decided to send him off the field altogether.
Ajinkya Rahane recently shed light on the incident, claiming that Yashasvi Jaiswal 'unknowingly' crossed the line, and that he had to take the drastic measure for the promising cricketer's sake.
"He might have been upset with me for this. You can sledge, you can say some things to the opposition, but you must never cross the line. I thought, in that moment, unknowingly, the line was crossed by him," Rahane said on the Curly Tales YouTube channel. (23:54)
"If I had not sent him off the field, then he could have been banned for the next four matches. So, I took the call instinctively. The match referee came up to me later and said that he was about to ban Jaiswal, but did not expect me to take him off the field. In the end he was punished with a fine of 15 or 20 percent of his match fees," Rahane added. (24:15)
Jaiswal had come back to the field after seven overs of play.
Yashasvi Jaiswal was the player of the match in the 2022 Duleep Trophy Final
While the contest was a bit marred for Yashasvi Jaiswal due to the incident, luckily for him, it is remembered for his sensational double hundred. The left-handed batter was dismissed for just one run in the first innings but made amends to pile on 265 runs off 323 deliveries in the second innings.
West Zone piled on 585-4 in the second innings to negate South Zone's 57-run lead in the first innings. The Hanuma Vihari-led side folded out for 234 runs to lose the final by 294 runs.