Hardik Pandya received a nasty blow to his face from teammate Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the second ODI at Eden Gardens, Kolkata. Bhuvneshwar struck the ball with surprisingly brute force but did not get the elevation as it ended up hitting him in the face. The ball struck the grill as Pandya tried to move out of it’s way. The Eden Gardens stadium came to a standstill as Pandya fell on the ground and was struggling to stand up. Bhuvneshwar was concerned, the whole dressing room was concerned. Even bowler Nathan Coulter-Nile’s reacted quickly as he walked up to Pandya.
But Pandya got up and earned a loud cheer from the crowd and that’s when Bhuvneshwar breathes a sigh of relief. Though he revealed what went through his mind after the ball hit Pandya and after he got up and it’ has a touch of funny followed by concern and then getting back to the business.
Bhuvneshwar’s reaction after hitting Pandya
“I checked my bat just to reconfirm that it was indeed me who struck the ball with so much power. When he got hit, we were all worried,” Bhuvneshwar told BCCI’s website bcci.tv. He added: “It looked like a serious blow, but thankfully he was alright. Once he was back on his feet, we began planning about building a partnership.”
Here’s the video of the incident-
WHACK – Pandya Knocked Down! https://t.co/cnug4HJR5F #BCCI
— Cricket-atti (@cricketatti) September 21, 2017
The incident happened in the 47th over. Bhuvneshwar was looking for boundaries, he had already hit one in the over through a top edge. After a slower delivery could not find the middle of Bhuvneshwar’s bat, he made up his mind to take on Coulter-Nile as there were just 21 balls left in the first innings and he aimed to score as much as he could. Bhuvneshwar struck a full-length delivery and that’s when the unfortunate incident happened.
Though Bhuvneshwar and Hardik had a great day with the ball taking three and two wickets respectively and helping India to a comfortable win by 50 runs.
