Australian cricketers were so keen on protecting their lucrative IPL deals that they felt “scared” of sledging India captain Virat Kohli and his teammates during a particular period and instead “sucked up” to them, former skipper Michael Clarke has claimed.
India and Australia have had some memorable bilateral duels, but Clarke felt that whenever the Australians would face India, their eyes would be trained on the cash-rich league which is played in April-May every year.
“Everybody knows how powerful India are in regards to the financial part of the game, internationally or domestically with the IPL,” Clarke told Big Sports Breakfast.
“I feel that Australian cricket and probably every other team over a little period went the opposite and actually sucked up to India. They were too scared to sledge Kohli or the other Indian players because they had to play with them in the IPL,” the World Cup winning Australian captain said, dropping a bombshell.
Clarke believes that some of Australia’s ruthless on-field character got compromised because the top-10 draws at the IPL auctions gave an impression that they would never sledge Kohli.
“… If Kohli or Rohit Sharma is the captain in the IPL, name a list of 10 players, they are bidding for these Australian players to get into their IPL teams. So the players are like, ‘Well, I’m not going to sledge Kohli. I want him to pick me for (Royal Challengers) Bangalore, so I can make, you know, a million US dollars for my six weeks’.
“And I sort of feel that was where Australia went through that little phase, became a lot softer or not as hard as what we’re accustomed to seeing,” Clarke said about the time after the ball-tampering scandal when terms like “elite honesty” were propagated.
Clarke, however, believes there was a cricketing reason too behind Australia not “winding up” Kohli, who he rated as one of the top batsmen he had played with or against.
“I feel some players think he might try and play that big shot early out of aggression or frustration. But yeah, I sort of feel Kohli is one of those players that you are better off saying nothing to and just allowing him to hopefully be a little bit sleepy at the start of his innings and make a mistake.”
