Michael Atherton Offers ‘Peace’ To Sunil Gavaskar On Behalf Of Nasser Hussain, Gavaskar Responds
Former England cricketer Michael Atherton made an appearance on Sony Sports’ pre-match program on Day 2 to offer peace to Sunil Gavaskar. The Indian batting legend was involved in a heated discussion with Nasser Hussain, who claimed that the Indian teams of the olden days used to get ‘bullied’.
Gavaskar was visibly offended by Hussain’s comments in an article the latter wrote for the English media site, The Daily Mail. Hussain claimed that the Virat Kohli-led team won’t get bullied unlike the ones of previous generations. Atherton, who is a close friend of Hussain, offered peace on Hussain’s behalf.
“I have come to offer peace from Nasser Hussain’s behalf after what happened yesterday,” Atherton stated.
Gavaskar, who was sitting alongside former pacer Ajit Agarkar and presenter Harsha Bhogle, laughed the incident off but cleared his stance on the matter.
“I never took a backward step so I’m not gonna do that even now. This should be pretty much known to those who know me by now,” 72-year-old Gavaskar said.
“I’d be very upset if my generation was being talked about as being bullied” – Sunil Gavaskar
The incident which made Gavaskar lose his cool occurred on Day 1 of the Headingley Test between England and India. Quoting a statement from Nasser Hussain’s article for the Daily Mail, Gavaskar had questioned what exactly did Nasser mean by ‘getting bullied’.
“I just think, the Indian side under the aggression of the past would have said ‘no no no’. But what Kohli has done is to make them go doubly hard. I saw a little bit of that in Sourav Ganguly’s side and he started that, Virat is continuing with it. Even when Virat was not there, Ajinkya (Rahane) really went hard at the Australians. I just don’t think you want to wake this Indian side up,” Hussain had replied.
Not one to back down from a verbal confrontation, Gavaskar put his point across with a few numbers. He asserted that his generation wasn’t bullied by anyone and they stood up for themselves.
“But when you say previous generations were bullied, I don’t think so. I’d be very upset if my generation was being talked about as being bullied. If you have a look at the record, in 1971 we won, that was my first tour in England.”
“[In] 1974, we had internal problems so we lost 3-0. [In] 1979, we lost 1-0, it could have been 1-1 if we chased down 438 at the Oval [India were on 429/8]. [In]1982, we again lost 1-0. In 1986 we won 2-0, we could have won it 3-0. So, I don’t think my generation was bullied,” Gavaskar retorted.
Gavaskar was instrumental in India’s victory in the 1986 tour of England.
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