Hilarious Paine moment leaves reporter red-faced
Tim Paine has left reporters in stitches and one journalist a little red-faced with a hilarious moment after day two of the fourth Test in Sydney.
Despite seeing his side absolutely dominated by the Indians again at the SCG, Paine showed that his sense of humour hadn’t deserted him.
‘SHOCKING’: Starc savaged after setting horrible bit of unwanted history
HERO TO ZERO: Indian fans brutally turn on first innings centurion
CHEEKY LYON: Spinner’s quip to Indian centurion goes viral
The Aussie skipper was fronting a media contingent to discuss the state of play after stumps on day two when a ringing mobile phone interrupted proceedings.
Paine casually picked up the call, before politely explaining that the recipient of the call was a little preoccupied.
“Tim Paine speaking … who is it sorry? Who are you after?” Paine asked.
“Martin? He’s in the middle of a press conference, can I get him to call you back?
“No worries, I’ll tell him to check his emails.”
Roars of laughter echoed from the room as the Aussie skipper hung up the phone – the mood in stark contrast to Australia’s day proceeding day in Sydney.
Paine didn’t have much to be cheery about after seeing India put his side to the sword again on day two before eventually posting 7(dec)-622 on Friday.
The Aussie captain denies he and his bowlers were on a different page, despite bowling coach David Saker admitting there was confusion between the captain and his attack.
Saker laid the boot into Australia’s bowlers after the opening day at the SCG, before India went on to post the sixth highest score by a visiting team in Australia.
Nathan Lyon was another member of the team to publicly question whether his team’s fast bowlers got it right on day one.
The Aussies struggled to get any real momentum on either of the opening two days, with India posting two century stands and one worth 204 runs.
India’s smallest partnership was 10 runs for the first wicket
But Paine said there was no disagreement over plans to any of the Indian batsmen, and that the team had simply got it wrong at times on the opening two days.
“We always have a discussion post-game but in terms of being on a different page, no,” he said.
“I think we’re pretty clear on what we’re trying to do.
“Yesterday afternoon – and to be fair probably the first hour in the morning then the first hour after lunch (on Friday) – we got it slightly wrong.
“It can sometimes look like that but we know what we’re trying to do. Sometimes you don’t quite execute and teams can get away from you and that’s what happened.”
Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood delivered lively new-ball spells on day one but then unsuccessfully attempted to unsettle century-maker Cheteshwar Pujara and Mayank Agarwal with a bouncer barrage.
“The bowlers wanted one thing. Tim wanted one thing,” Saker told the ABC on Friday morning.
“That’s not been the case as the general rule but when you were watching from the sideline, you could see there was some confusion.”
Saker and head coach Justin Langer both made their disappointment clear in no uncertain terms.
“Last night we talked quite heavily about the day … we thought it was a really disappointing day and we just wanted to get our point across,” Saker said.
“Some of it was quite aggressive and that’s not like me usually.
“I was quite animated, and I know I was not the only one. JL wasn’t happy. The bowlers know that.”
Lyon also gave his teammates a clip while speaking to the same broadcaster.
“I wasn’t too happy about it,” Lyon said of the quicks’ short-pitched approach early on day one.
“We missed out on using the moisture in the wicket. We could have stuck there longer. But the captain and the bowlers came up with a decent plan and, unfortunately, it didn’t work.”
With AAP
