India women’s team captain Harmanpreet Kaur has been suspended for two international matches for two separate breaches of the ICC’s code of conduct.
Both incidents took place during the third match of the ICC Women’s Championship series against Bangladesh on Saturday.
The first came when Kaur “expressed frustration” at her dismissal by hitting the wickets with her bat. She was judged to have been caught at slip off spinner Nahida Akter in the 34th over of India’s innings.
For the first offence, Kaur was fined 50 per cent of her match fee and received three demerit points on her disciplinary record as she was found guilty of breaching article 2.8 of the ICC Code of Conduct for Players and Player Support Personnel, relating to “showing dissent at an umpire’s decision”.
The second offence came as, during the presentation ceremony after the match, Kaur openly criticised the umpiring of the game.
For this offence, she was also fined 25 per cent of her match fee for a Level 1 offence relating to “public criticism in relation to an incident occurring in an international match” and she received one demerit point on her disciplinary record for the same.
Kaur admitted to the offences and agreed to the sanctions proposed by Akhtar Ahmed of the Emirates ICC International Panel of Match Referees. As a result, there was no need for a formal hearing.
In Kaur’s instance, the accumulation of four demerit points from the offences converted to two suspension points, leading to her suspension from either one Test match or two ODIs or two T20Is, whichever comes first for the team.
