Former Indian all-rounder Irfan Pathan questioned Yashasvi Jaiswal’s captaincy after Rajasthan Royals suffered a huge loss of 77 runs against Gujarat Titans at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium, Jaipur on Saturday.
Jaiswal was leading RR for the first time when regular skipper Riyan Parag was ruled out with a hamstring injury. Pathan recalled an incident from the match when the final delivery of the 13th over by Yash Raj Punja was adjudged a wide by the umpire.
However, wicket-keeper Dhruv Jurel had no discussion with the bowler and the skipper when the umpire made the signal. Pathan said it looked like a wide from commentator’s perspective.
The former Indian bowler said the coordination on the field was completely missing between the keeper and RR stand-in skipper.
Irfan Pathan said on his YouTube Channel, “Another thing I did not understand was that when Yashasvi Jaiswal came out as captain for the toss, the coordination on the field was missing completely. There was a delivery from Punja. It was the sixth ball and the umpire still called it wide. Dhruv Jurel, the wicketkeeper, collected the ball. Now as a wicketkeeper, he should know whether the ball has gone near the wide line or outside it. From our perspective as commentators, it looked like it was not a wide. But Jurel simply threw the ball back to the bowler. There was no discussion with the captain, and the captain also did not communicate with him. That was confusing.”
Pathan highlighted that GT skipper Shubman Gill was able to capitalise on the extra delivery by hitting a boundary.
“Then what happened on the very next ball? Because the umpire had wrongly given it as a wide, which was confirmed on the replay later, Shubman Gill hit a reverse sweep for a four. At the very least, there should be communication. There should be coordination. There should be some checking between players. That lack of coordination was not understandable at all. RR will need to give serious attention to this going forward.”
Rajasthan Royals will next take on Delhi Capitals at the Arun Jaitley Stadium, Delhi, on Sunday.
