Tempers flare again as Smith calls Vijay 'cheat'

The India-Australia series might be on its last leg, but the hostilities between the two sides continue to fester. On a day of complete Indian domination, words were exchanged and tempers soared.The prominent one was the TV camera capturing Australian captain Steven Smith in the dressing room calling Murali Vijay 'cheat' when the Indian fielder at the second slip claimed to have taken the low catch of Josh Hazlewood. 

With Hazlewood being the last batsman out, the Indian team ran up the dressing room to get ready to bat in the second innings. However, the television replays showed that Vijay had taken it off the turf. The television cameras then showed an incensed Smith.Australian batting coach Graeme Hick, however, tried to play down the issue.

“I haven’t seen that part of it but I was watching it on – we have our own



little pads there watching it and the ball definitely touched the ground, so the process is in place, play resumed. I have not seen anything or heard anything of that, so until I do, I am not going to comment on it. That’s for other people to comment on, not me,” he said.

“I mean having fielded in slips and close to the bat, sometimes you're not a 100% sure. He would've felt that go into his fingers and felt that it was a clean catch. If anything, once the batter or whoever maybe has gone for the review, yeah fair enough, maybe the fielder should stand around and wait. The processes are in place. At times, this series has been a little bit heated, but I think this game has been played in very good spirit and he obviously thought he had a clean catch. It goes upstairs, comes back and gets on with the game.”