Sledging Him Was A Waste Of Time: Tim Paine Reveals The India Player Who Does Not Get Bothered By Sledging

Sledging, banter, drama and a high-level competition between bat and ball have always been the key ingredients whenever India and Australia lock horns on a cricket field. Over the years, this famous rivalry has witnessed some really classic sledging incidents and the series between the two teams that took place in 2018-19 was not an exception either.

Australia skipper Tim Paine took the onus on himself to get the under the skin of the Indian players during the historic tour. The wicketkeeper-batsman could not really make an impact with the bat in the series but did make his presence felt with his non-stop comments from behind the stumps. And the one incident that caught everyone’s attention was the babysitter sledge that took place in the Melbourne Test.

When Rishabh Pant walked out to bat, Tim Paine tried to unsettle him right from ball one and it led to some absolutely hilarious words from the Australia skipper. India had just recalled MS Dhoni to their T20I side and Paine used that to tease Pant before concluding his comment with the hilarious babysitter line, saying:

“Tell you what big MS is back in the one day squad. Should get this bloke down to Hurricanes.. They need a batter. Fancy that extend you Aussie holiday, beautiful town Hobart too… get him a water front apartment. Have him over for dinner. Do you babysit? I can take my wife to the movies while you watch the kids.”

Sledging a waste of time:

Tim Paine recently opened up about the famous babysitter sledge. While commentating during the ongoing Big Bash League, the Australia skipper said that boredom led to that sledge before revealing that his words did not have any effect on Pant. Tim Paine revealed that Australia discovered it very early that Pant does not get bothered by sledging.

“Geez we were bored. Could not get a wicket,” Tim Paine said on air.

“Well Rick (Ponting) knows him quite well — one, he’s very very good, but two, we found out early in that series that sledging him was a waste of time. It just didn’t bother him, but what we found was that you could get a real lapse of concentration out of him so we went a bit that way,” Paine added.

He further said that his only motive behind sledging Pant was to make the latter play a poor shot that could have led to his dismissal.

“So I just tried to put him off and talk rubbish to try and get him involved because he was likely to play a poor shot at time. But he’s a seriously talented player,” said Paine.

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