Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) coach Justin Langer came out in the open to reveal the details of the KL Rahul-Sanjiv Goenka episode which took place after their 10-wicket loss to SunRisers Hyderabad (SRH) in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024.
As per the former Australia head coach, Rahul and Goenka are the calmest people and he was surprised to witness the animated behavior from the LSG owner. He, however, clarified that it was only a passionate discussion between the two players about what went wrong in the game.
“It was incredible,” he said in an exclusive interview with RevSportz. “I’ve thought about this a lot over the last four days. I’ve had four surprises in my life. And they were the sexes (genders) of my daughters when they were born. They kept coming out… ‘It’s a girl’, ‘it’s a girl’, ‘it’s a girl’…Four girls, but we didn’t know leading up, so it was a great surprise.
“So, when I saw the reaction the other night, it was like the fifth surprise of my life. Anyone who knows MrGoenka, or anyone who knows KL Rahul …they’re the calmest, most peaceful men on the planet. So, when I saw there was a bit of arms going on about, I thought I’ve never seen this before because they’re both so calm.
“But then, when I went and listened to the conversation, it was just the passion and the gesturing. Actually, they were just talking about where our plan went wrong for the game. And it went wrong! We had a really bad game. Travis Head, the openers for Sunrisers [Hyderabad] were brilliant. Bhuvi [Bhuvneshwar Kumar] bowled beautifully to us early, and they beat us really well.
“That’s the funny thing about the aftermath of what happened. No one knew what was said. And I was like, I’m so surprised, as with the birth of my daughters, because I heard what was said, and it was all about the plan. Just a bit of cricket talk. In a lot of ways, I’m laughing about it. It’s been such an awesome relationship so far between MrGoenka, Shashwat, his son, KL and myself. It’s been brilliant, so chilled out.”
Rahul has featured in 12 matches of the ongoing season. He has accumulated 460 runs this season at an average of 38.33 with the highest score of 82. The wicketkeeper batter also became the fastest India opener to reach 4000 runs in the ongoing season.
LSG find themselves in a challenging spot after the loss to SRH. The Rahul-led side are currently placed on the sixth spot in the IPL 2024 points table with 12 points. They will next take on Delhi Capitals on May 14 and already eliminated Mumbai Indians on May 17.
