Rajasthan Royals' experienced off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin has been fined 25% of his match fee for breaching the Indian Premier League's (IPL) Code of Conduct during Wednesday's match against Chennai Super Kings at the MA Chidambaram Stadium.
Ashwin admitted to the Level 1 Offence under Article 2.7 of the IPL's Code of Conduct. This Article deals with public criticism of or inappropriate comments in relation to incidents occurring in a match or any player, team official, match official or team participating in a match, irrespective of when such criticism or inappropriate comment is made. The Match Referee's decision is final and binding for Level 1 breaches of the Code of Conduct.
In the post-match press conference after Rajasthan won by three wickets, Ashwin questioned the decision of on-field umpires to change the ball during the 12th over due to dew during Chennai's chase of 176, despite his team not asking for any such change.
"I'm quite surprised the umpires changed the ball for dew on their own. It's never happened before, and I'm quite surprised. Some of the decisions in this year's IPL on the field have left me a little flummoxed, to be honest," said Ashwin.
"What reason -- I did ask the umpire, but he said we can change it. So I hope every time there's dew they can change it -- every single time going forward in this IPL. You can do whatever you want, but you need to be standard," he added.
As per the IPL Code of Conduct, Article 2.7, "when assessing the seriousness of the breach, without limitation, the context within which the comments have been made, and the gravity of the offending comments must be taken into account."
Now leading the points table with six points from four matches, Rajasthan will face defending champions Gujarat Titans at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on Sunday.