by Veena Gabriel
How can Symonds lag behind? After all he and Harbhajjan played out the whole “monkeygate” saga between the two. The rest were merely onlookers.
How come all the Australian cricket writers had their books scheduled to come out during India tour? Perhaps they knew the only selling point was the cash cow- “The infamous Monkey Gate” ensured the sale of their otherwise ordinary many cricket books.
Anyway in his book, Symonds has given a first hand account of what actually happened that fateful day. And as it is clear from his account even he is to be blamed equally.
They were back from tea and Bhajji had scored a 50, He took a single off Brett Lee and he tapped him on the back with his hand. May be that irked Symonds because he jumped and told Bhajji not to be “Palsy Walsy” just because he had scored few runs. In our language it meant no need to be so friendly just because you have scored a few runs.
Now after putting Bhajji down, how did he expect that the fiery off-spinner would take it lying down? Of course he retaliated and what is the best language to retaliate your mother tongue, after all you can be very comfortable and fluent in it.
As per Symonds, Bhajji did not appreciate his language and their exchange continued while they changed positions at the end of the over. Obviously Symonds must have said something very rude because Bhajji called him over and said something which the Australian felt was monkey. The rest is history.
But going through this particular chapter, one can easily read through the lines and it will be crystal clear that both Symonds and Bhajji had heated exchange and Symonds started it.
It is a different issue that after wards the Australians put all the blame on Indian off spinner.
They can cry foul but in their heart of hearts they know the truth.
