BCCI 'rubbishes' Kohli sledging claim

The BCCI have refuted reports claiming India captain Virat Kohli had denigrated his rival skipper Tim Paine during the second Domain Test at Perth Stadium.

It had been reported by some Australian media outlets Kohli had made a comment to Paine about his status as Australia captain during play on the fourth day.

However, the BCCI have defended their skipper in a media statement posted on Tuesday night.

"There are reports doing the rounds in the media and across social media platforms claiming India Captain Virat Kohli got involved in a banter with Australia Captain Tim Paine during the 2nd Test at Perth," the statement on the BCCI website read.

"It is ‘assumed’ that Kohli said, ‘I am the best player in the world and you are just a stand-in captain’. These claims were based on hearsay and the BCCI would like to bring into notice that no such words were spoken on the field by the Indian captain.

"The BCCI got a clarification from the team management about the incident and would like to classify the reports as baseless."

Stump microphones picked up plenty of banter between the opposing captains during play on the fourth day, with the two skippers coming face-to-face while Paine was at the crease in Australia’s second innings. Umpire Chris Gaffaney intervened at one stage of the pair’s exchange.

"That's enough ... play the game," Gaffaney said at the time. "You boys are the captains. Play the game."

Paine’s response to the umpire was: "There's no swearing. We're just having a conversation." 

But Gaffaney reminded the skippers of their roles. "You're the captain, Tim," he said.

Ricky Ponting labelled the incidents as "pretty light-hearted" and Kohli echoed the comments of the former Australia captain during his post-match press conference.

"As long as there's no swearing out there on the field, and there's no personal attacks, the line doesn't get crossed," Kohli said.

Microphones also picked up Paine saying to Murali Vijay, "You can't like him as a bloke", in reference to Kohli who was back in the Indian dressing room.

Paine also played down any on-field banter between the teams, but indicated his team were “not going to sit back and be walked all over".

"I think we're finding a really good balance in that sense, so I'm really happy with the way we're going about it," Paine said.

Australia won the second Test by 146 runs and the ICC have not advised of any charges being laid from the encounter.

The third Test between Australia and India commences on Boxing Day in Melbourne, with the final Test a week later in Sydney. 

Domain Test Series v India

Dec 6-10: India won by 31 runs

Dec 14-18: Australia won by 146 runs

Dec 26-30: Third Test, MCG

Jan 3-7: Fourth Test, SCG

Australia squad: Tim Paine (c, wk), Josh Hazlewood (vc), Mitch Marsh (vc), Pat Cummins, Aaron Finch, Peter Handscomb, Marcus Harris, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Nathan Lyon, Shaun Marsh, Peter Siddle, Mitchell Starc, Chris Tremain

India squad: Virat Kohli (c), Murali Vijay, KL Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Hardik Pandya, Hanuma Vihari, Rohit Sharma, Rishabh Pant (wk), Parthiv Patel (wk), Ravi Ashwin, Ravi Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma, Umesh Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar