South Africa’s Pakistan-born wrist-spinner Imran Tahir faced tremendous embarrassment in a warm-up game on October 31 when he caught a catch off a no-ball and mocked the local crowd behind him. This happened in Canberra where the South Africans took on an inexperienced Australian Prime Minister’s XI and lost the match by 4 wickets. It was not the start that the visitors were looking, especially at the start of the series Down Under.
It all happened in the sixth over during the PM XI’s chase when the batsman, Josh Philippe pulled a no-ball from pacer Kagiso Rabada to find the hands of Tahir at the deep fine leg. However, Tahir did not notice the umpire’s decision and after catching the ball, he looked back at the crowd behind him and then showed them the name on the back of his shirt. By the time he threw back the ball to the middle in full zest, the PM XI batsmen had already taken two runs, leaving the commentators amused.
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One of the Fox Sports commentators asked, “What is he doing down there,” while another said, “Did not hear the no-ball call.” In fact, Tahir’s consequent gesture of pointing to his shirt back once again after the incident meant the cricketer did not have any idea of what had happened even minutes later. The commentators were in splits this time.
Here’s the video:
Imran Tahir might want to check if it was a no ball first 😂😂😂 #FoxCricket #PMXIvSA pic.twitter.com/zDvOs74n9h
— FOX SPORTS Cricket (@FoxCricket) October 31, 2018
Imran has taken 270 international wickets but had an ordinary day in the field as he fell for a duck and gave away 47 runs in 10 overs taking just one wicket. He surely had some unpleasant experience with the crowd which made his body language outspoken after taking the catch off an illegal delivery.
The Proteas will be playing three ODIs and one T20I during their two-week long tour of Australia. The first ODI will be played in Perth on November 4. This is the first time that the two teams are meeting each other since their tainted Test series played in South Africa earlier this year.
