While India is giving a tough fight on the filed in the third test against Australia in Melbourne, off the field in the stands things got heated up as the spectators have been warned against racist chants.
On the field both the skippers Virat Kohli and Tim Paine were involved in a verbal spat which led to a controversy, which is a normal thing in any India-Australia match. However, the words used by some of the spectators haven’t been deemed healthy by the officials.
Chants of ‘show us your visa’ were heard at the MCG for the first two games of the Boxing Day Test. The footage of one of such incidents was acquired by ESPNCricinfo and was handed over to the Cricket Australia, which has further forwarded it to Victoria Police and stadium management.
“Victoria Police and stadium security are monitoring the behaviour of the crowd in that section of the stadium,” a CA spokesperson was quoted as saying by ESPNCricinfo. “And have had several discussions with those fans in that bay to remind them about appropriate crowd behaviour, as per venue entry terms and conditions,”
Some other chants like “Kohli’s a wanker”, were also heard from a section of the crowd.
The warning read:
“I will not engage in any conduct (whether through the use of language, gestures or otherwise) which is likely to offend, insult, humiliate, intimidate, threaten, disparage or vilify any other person (including any player, match official, other official or other patron) on the basis of their gender, race, religion, culture, colour, sexual orientation, descent or national or ethnic origin.
“If I fail to comply with this condition, I may be refused admission to, or evicted from, the Venue by any Authorised Person without refund or compensation of any kind; and I must deliver up any and all Tickets that I have in my possession at the request of an Authorised Person. In addition, I acknowledge that the failure to comply with this condition may result in the imposition of other sanctions (such as being banned from the Venue in the future) and possible further action including criminal prosecution.”
Video Courtesy: ESPNCricinfo