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Australia's Xavier Bartlett pays the price for dismissing Virat Kohli for a duck in Adelaide; punished by fans online
Xavier Bartlett faced online backlash after dismissing Virat Kohli for a duck in the second India vs Australia ODI at the Adelaide Oval.
While it is nothing short of a dream-come-true moment for most young cricketers to get Virat Kohli out in an international fixture, it doesn't take much time to turn into a nightmare if they are active on social media. Australian fast bowler Xavier Bartlett was the latest victim of that when he became a target of the emotionally driven, heavily polarised Virat Kohli fans. Bartlett paid the price for getting Kohli out for a duck in the second ODI against India at the Adelaide Oval on Thursday.
Bartlett, 26, trapped Kohli leg-before-wicket for a duck — the Indian superstar’s second consecutive scoreless outing of the series and the first of its kind in his glittering international career — as Australia sealed a nervy two-wicket victory to clinch the three-match series. The dismissal, however, triggered an outpouring of anger from sections of Indian fans online, many of whom flooded Bartlett’s Instagram account with abuse.
It didn't help that Kohli waved goodbye to the Adelaide crowd while returning to the pavilion, which social media believed was a signal of his ODI retirement.
The young Queensland pacer, who has over 22,000 followers on the platform, had not posted since August 1, but his most recent upload, which incidentally has a photo with Kohli in the IPL, has now drawn more than 4,400 comments — a number that continues to rise. Many of the remarks have been vile and mocking in nature, with the most common insult referring to Kohli as Bartlett’s “father.”
The reaction mirrors the online trolling faced by fellow Australian quick Mitchell Starc, who dismissed Kohli for an eight-ball duck in Perth earlier in the series. Despite the vitriol, Bartlett has received strong backing from his teammates and the wider cricket community, with many condemning the harassment as unacceptable.
Speaking after Thursday’s match, Bartlett was humble about the prized wicket, acknowledging Kohli’s stature in the game. “Probably one of the best white-ball players of all time,” he told Fox Cricket. “Lucky to get him, I tried to bowl an outswinger and it nipped back. Probably a bit of pure luck but nice to see the back of him early.”
Kohli’s back-to-back ducks mark the first time in his illustrious ODI career that he has been dismissed without scoring in consecutive innings, and only the second time he has registered a duck on Australian soil. The 36-year-old, who has already retired from Test and T20 cricket, has one final chance to find form in the third and final match of the series at the SCG on Saturday.
