Indian cricket women’s team captain Harmanpreet Kaur has been suspended for two international matches after his sensational outburst against the umpires in Dhaka after the third and final ODI ended in a tie last month. Harmanpreet’s suspension means that she will miss India’s first two matches in the upcoming Asian Games 2023 tournament next month.
Even a month after the outburst will resulted in Harmanpreet ending up in the dock, the Indian captain revealed that she has no regrets about her actions.
“I will not say that I regret anything because at the end of the day as a player you want to see that fair things are happening. As a player you always have the right to express yourself and what you’re feeling,” she told ‘The Cricket Paper’ on the sidelines of the ‘Women’s Hundred’ as stated by ESPNcrcinfo website.
“I don’t think I said anything wrong to any player or any person. I just said what happened on the field. I don’t regret anything,” she added.
During the Dhaka ODI, Harmanpreet expressed her displeasure with the umpiring by breaking the stumps with her bat and then went on to term the umpiring ‘pathetic’ at the post-match presentation. Harmanpreet received three demerit points for ‘showing dissent at an umpiring decision’ and another for ‘public criticism’ of match officials, in addition to fines of 50 per cent and 25 per cent of her match fee for the two violations.
“I don’t think I said anything wrong to any player or any person. I just said what happened on the field. I don’t regret anything.”
~ Harmanpreet Kaur
pic.twitter.com/VRTEisx5H3
— Cricketopia (@CricketopiaCom) August 20, 2023
According to ICC, Kaur was fined 50 per cent of her match fee for the Level 2 offence and received three demerit points on her disciplinary record. As a result, Harmanpreet will miss the first two matches of India’s campaign at the Asian Games 2023 T20 competition in Hanghzou in September-October.
Meanwhile, Harmanpreet Kaur hailed the Women’s Premier League (WPL) as a game-changing event in the history of women’s cricket in India. Speaking on the sidelines of ‘The Hundred’ tournament, Harmanpreet has said that WPL received more interest than BCCI’s flagship event – Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 season – from certain sections of the audience
“WPL was a game changer for us. That tournament was so good. Everyone loved it back home. The response we got, trust me, some of the audience was more interested in women’s IPL than men’s because it was something new to watch,” Harmanpreet Kaur, who turns out for Trent Rockets, said on Daggers & Lyds podcast last week.