Indian coach Ravi Shastri knew hard drinks weren't allowed inside the field, so he had a very simple funny trick up his sleeve that he had been using for years now.
He mixed Bourbon in his tea in his tea flask. HAH!
On Day 2 of the Adelaide Test, the Indian team returned to the dugout with smiles all around, having bundled Australia out for 191.
"A nice day," Mayank told Rahul pleasantly, plucking the energy drink out of his hands and drinking and ignoring Rahul's colourful choice of words.
"A tiring one, too," put in Vihari, who had overheard.
"Of course...whole day in the field..." said Mayank.
"You don't get to rest, Mayu," said Rahul sadistically, trying to get back at him for stealing his Red Bull.
"I know," groaned Mayank.
Pujji grinned over at Mayank and Prithvi, both of whom were padding up. "Don't dare get out today, either of you, I will not go out to bat today."
"We'll try," assured Mayank.
The last thing the openers heard before jogging out to the field was Pujji complaining to Rahul, "I don't want this strange drink, I want tea!"
"So," Mayank said darkly to Prithvi. "Rahul offered Pujji his Red Bull, an abused me for taking it."
Prithvi smiled impishly as he darted ahead.
********
"I don't have tea, Pujji bhai," said Kuldeep.
"Neither do I," snorted Jaddu. "We're the bench, darling, not the chefs."
"As if it takes chefs to bring a bit of tea," groaned Pujji. Tea was the only thing he got cranky about.
"Shastri sir brought a flask of tea," said Vihari, who was of a helpful disposition.
Pujara, who was genuinely a looks-can-be-deceptive kind of person, looked around to order someone, and his eye fell on Jinks.
"I'm not Prithvi or Kuldeep," said Jinks firmly. "Get the flask yourself."
"Why are people making such a fuss over a flask of tea?" said Ash, annoyed, because he had been trying to have a sensible conversation with Virat about a game plan.
Pujji subsided and finally got an unwilling Kuldeep to bring the flask for him; Shastri sir was nowhere to be seen at present.
"Ah, thank god," said Pujara, pouring the entire contents of the flask down his throat and finally managing to quench his thrist. "This tasted weird," he added to Jinks, as an afterthought.
"It has been lying in the cold for a whole day, Pujji," said Jinks. "Do you expect it to taste like room service?"
"I guess not," admitted Pujji.
"His stance," said Virat with a desperate sort of resignation.
"Whose?"
"Prithvi's..."
And sure enough, Prithvi got cleaned up by Cummins two deliveries later due to the gaping hole between his bat and pads.
As the kid started trudging towards the dugout, his head bent, Jinks saw that Pujara hadn't made any move to put on his pads at all.
"Get a move on," he said, nudging him with an elbow.
"I don't—" faltered Pujji.
Virat turned to look at him. "Don't what?"
"Can you—can you send a nightwatchman?" asked Pujji, going red. "I don't feel..."
Jinks and Virat exchanged a worried glance.
The normal Pujji would never have asked for a nightwatchman.
"I'll go, shall I, Virat bhaiya?"
Virat found himself looking into the bright eyes of Jasprit Bumrah, their 9-down basman.
"You want to?"
"YES! YES, YES!"
Jinks winced. Jassi really needed to cut down his time with Hardik; he was rapidly losing all his sanity.
"Go then," said Virat with a grin full of affection. "Just a couple of overs left, try to play it out."
"Sure," said Jassi with supreme confidence.
********
Mayank surveyed in grim silence as Jassi bounded up to the pitch, padded up, full of beans.
"I hope you have come here with a message," he said.
"I'm here to BAT," said Jassi with dignity.
Mayank turned his eyes heavenward.
"Oh god, now do I have to protect you from the strike?"
"I'll protect you," promised Jassi.
*********
"You're ok?" Virat asked Pujji in mild concern.
"Yeah...I mean, yes," said Pujji, wondering why his head was spinning this much. A day under the sun might've done that, but there had hardly been any sun at the Adelaide that day. He went up to join Virat and Jaddu, who were sitting in the front.
Jassi blocked ball after ball with so much expertise that the entire dugout was to be found in hysterics not long after.
Pujji was laughing the most of all, and clapping quite literally hysterically, which struck to no one as particularly normal.
Then Jassi turned down a single to Mayank, who had been trying his best to take back the strike in the last over, not wanting to give the Aussies a rotten edge right at the end.
Mayank stared at him, giving an almost imperceptible facepalm, but the team, gazing avidly, noticed, and also noticed Jassi drawing himself up to his full height to assert that he was not to be taken lightly.
"He's—he's—" gasped Jinks. "Hilarious."
Now Rahul was laughing the loudest, so much so that Virat reached over to feel his forehead.
"You and Pujji have caught a stroke of the sun, Rahuliya."
Jassi left the last ball alone—and it was Stumps, Day II, a very, very successful day indeed for Team India.
