Felt like a punching bag watching Virat Kohli’s aggressive celebrations, shares Justin Langer

India’s Australia tour of 2018-19 was the onset of a glorious period for Indian cricket in the longest format as the unprecedented success they enjoyed Down Under fuelled a dominant home run where the men in blue enjoyed a streak of series wins in red-ball cricket. The tour also saw India win their first Test series Down Under which was the 2-1 win in the Border Gavaskar Trophy, followed by a 2-1 win in the ODI series.

Australia coach Justin Langer shared how helpless he felt not being able to reply to skipper Virat Kohli’s aggressive celebration as the Kangaroos were looking to rebuild their image after the devastating turn of events in South Africa following the sandpaper gate. Langer conceded that he felt like a punching bag seeing the series slip through their fingers.

"I remember that afternoon (feeling) like a punching bag. We can't fight back because it felt like we had our hands behind our backs and we just had to take it," Langer said in Amazon's recently released docu-series titled 'The Test'.

"You must be feeling the double standards the way their captain is carrying on and we sort of have to be careful. Imagine if we behaved two out of ten (of) that.”

The former Australia batsman went on to point out that there is a big difference between banter and abuse and abuse has no place in the field of cricket. Langer asked his boys to get back to Kohli on field, following his on-field antics but warned them not to cross the line.

"There is a difference between abuse and banter. There is no room for abuse. We don't need to abuse him but there is banter where you stick up for your mate."