Sanjay Manjrekar has been marred with a lot of controversies in the recent past which has cost him dearly. He was ousted from the IPL 2020 commentary panel after his spat with the Indian all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja and also for taking a jibe at Harsha Bhogle on-air. Manjrekar is in the news again as he raised questions on Jadeja being a part of the Indian ODI team.
India’s tour of Australia didn’t start on a very good note as they have already lost the ODI series. Australian batsmen dominated in both the matches and went on to score big which proved to be a towering task for the Indian batsmen to chase. As a result, the Australian team got an unassailable 2-0 lead. Manjrekar’s remark on players like Jadeja came after India’s loss in the first ODI.
Earlier, Manjrekar had called Jadeja a ‘bits and pieces’ player, for which he garnered astringent criticism. Even Jadeja was very vocal about the remark and had replied angrily to Manjrekar’s comment asking him to stop his ‘verbal diarrhoea’. However, this time Jadeja seems to have taken the dig in a very cool manner.
Ravindra Jadeja wrote, ‘Stay Calm’
Manjrekar feels that when the selection is done, a player’s specialty should be looked upon. The player should fulfil one discipline properly. “My selection and thoughts are based on a principle that I have learnt over the years: if you have specialists who can walk-in based on one discipline, you fill your team with those players,” said Manjrekar to The Hindu.
He mentioned Jadeja once again talking about his kind of players and his dislike for them. “I do not have a problem with Jadeja; I have a problem with his kind of cricketers in white-ball cricket. Even Hardik Pandya will not be in my team. They add illusionary value to the team. Of course, I have always rated Jadeja highly in the Test format,” he added.
After a couple of days of Manjrekar’s comment, Ravindra Jadeja has replied but in an ambiguous manner. He tweeted a picture of himself holding a cup with the caption, “Stay Calm.” It looks like Jadeja is not bothered by the comments at all and is secure enough with his place in the team. Team India is playing the third ODI for their honour and to avoid a whitewash in the ODI series.
Stay calm #positivemindset pic.twitter.com/EcLxEZFmCB
— Ravindrasinh jadeja (@imjadeja) December 1, 2020
After the ODIs, team India will be playing the T20I and Test series as well.
