Watch: Virat Kohli sells Rishabh Pant down the river while taking a run, Twitterati slams the skipper
Indian skipper Virat Kohli sold Rishabh Pant down the river in Tuesday's T20I game against England while calling for a run. The moment came in the 12th over of India's innings. Rishabh Pant, batting brilliantly for his 25, punched a good-length ball off towards the sweeper cover and ran a couple of runs.
A throw came from deep in the boundary to wicketkeeper Jos Buttler at the striker's end who cheekily tried to deflect it to the stumps from behind and missed. Seeing this, Virat Kohli surprisingly called Rishabh Pant back for a third. Pant was content with the couple and was way beyond the crease at his end.
He hesitated but ultimately responded to his captain's call. The youngster ran harder than before but Buttler's throw at the non-striker's end reached before. Sam Curran dislodged the bails and Pant's dive fell a couple of meters short of the crease.
The dismissal brought to an end the 40-run partnership that was just starting to tee off and India went on to post a below-par total that was easily chased down by the visitors. Here's the video of the run out:
Twitter slams Virat Kohli for Rishabh Pant's runout
Meanwhile, fans on Twitter were furious with the Indian captain over Rishabh Pant's runout. While some believed that Rishabh Pant should have refused the third run straight away, others were unremitting in their criticism.
India's top-3 failed before Rishabh Pant's run out
Earlier, in the innings, India's new-look top-order fell like a pack of cards against England's pacers. KL Rahul was the first to go as he played down the wrong line to a blistering delivery from Mark Wood and lost his middle stump in the process.
Rohit Sharma fell next as he couldn't middle a hook shot off Mark Wood's 146.5 kph bouncer and gave a simple catch to the short fine leg. Ishan Kishan, coming in at 3, followed suit and got out in an identical fashion to Chris Jodan.