Hyderabad: Former India batter Sanjay Manjarekar cheekily referred to a his five-year-old comment in his commentary stint about Ravindra Jadeja during the ICC Men's Cricket T20 World Cup warm-up match between Men in Blue and Bangladesh at the Nassau Country International stadium in New York on Saturday where he said "Now it's Jadeja batting so I better shut up."
Team India are expecting to fulfil the responsibility as the finisher with Hardik Pandya. But Jadeja, who came out to bat at number seven, struggled to time the ball and managed to score only four runs off six balls. During his innings, Bangladesh players appealed for the stumping against him which was called not out by the third umpire. However, the commentator's take was thinking otherwise and suggested that the decision should've gone in Bangladesh's favour.
"He did not get his toes behind the line and only the toes, as you can see, are in contact with the ground. Now it's Jadeja batting so I better shut up," Manjarekar, who hails from Mumbai, said as the other two commentators started to laugh.
The incident captured the attention of the social media users in the short time. Some users backed the commentator on his take on the stumping decision while some called him the irritating.
"Sanjay Manjrekar is one of the most irritating commentators to ever exist. Neither does he talk with the rhythm of the game nor does he have good enough vocabulary to commentate on international matches," wrote @LxkxMxgxc, a random social media user, on his X handle.
"Someone tell Sanjay Manjrekar that people will forget about Hardik’s disastrous ipl season if you stop talking about how people should forget his disastrous IPL season every 3 seconds on the commentary," said Sameer Kulkarni (@esskaay94).
"Sanjay Manjrekar was absolutely right and he was trolled for no reason," wrote Fraud Farzii Engineer (@FarziiiEngineer).
During the 2019 ODI World Cup, Manjrekar remarked Ravindra Jadeja as a 'bits and pieces' player. However, the world number test all-rounder hit back by saying "Still I have played twice the number of matches you have played and I'm still playing. Learn to respect ppl who have achieved. I have heard enough of your verbal diarrhoea @sanjaymanjrekar."
Coming to the match, opting to bat, India rode on the Wicketkeeper-batter Rishabh Pant's (53 off 32 balls) fifty and Hardik Pandya's quickfire 40 as India posted a commendable 183 target in their allotted 20 overs. For Bangladesh, Mahedi Hasan, Shoriful Islam, Mahmudullah and Tanvir Islam got a wicket apiece.
In reply, Bangladesh were never in the game, ending their innings at 122 for 8 in 20 overs with Arshdeep Singh (2/13) getting some deliveries to swing up-front. Pandya, after a good hand with the bat, also got a wicket. Shivam Dube got a chance to bowl and took a couple of wickets.
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