'It’s ridiculous' - Mitchell Johnson slams people for entirely blaming Tim Paine for Australia's horrendous loss

Former Australian all-rounder Mitchell Johnson extended his support to Australia’s Test skipper Tim Paine after he was subjected to a lot of hate and criticism for Australia’s disastrous defeat at the prestigious Border Gavaskar Trophy against India by 2-1. India broke Australia’s 32-year-old record of being unbeaten at the Gabba by defeating them by 3 wickets.

This resulted in many veteran cricketers, cricket analysts and pundits including Michael Vaughan, Adam Gilchrist and Shane Warne accusing the Australian skipper for his poor leadership skills and his bad form with the willow and gloves. Some cricket fans also demanded Tim Paine to take a backseat and step down as Australia’s captain.

However, these comments didn’t go well with Mitchell Johnson as he slammed the people for coming up with ridiculous comments and blaming just the captain for the entire loss against India.

“It’s ridiculous. The comments that come out about that stuff is just nit-picking, and we’re seeing a lot of that these days,” Mitchell Johnson said while appearing on The Fast and the Curious Podcast.

It’s a sport and there’s competitiveness: Mitchell Johnson

Paine had donned the captain hat for Australia in the purest format of the game after their regular skipper Steve Smith was handed a one-year ban from cricket and two-year leadership ban for his active involvement in the Ball-tampering scandal of 2018 in Cape Town against South Africa.

Under his leadership, Australia retained the Ashes in 2019. However, the 36-year-old became the first Australian captain in 2019 to lose a Test series against India, led by Virat Kohli, at home. The same was repeated in Border Gavaskar Trophy of 2020-21, which has certainly lowered the stocks of Tim Paine.

Paine was also put under major scrutiny for his banter with Indian spinner Ravichandran Ashwin on the Day 5 of the Sydney Test. The captain had lost the control over his tongue and had ended up abusing Ashwin.

“It’s a sport and there’s competitiveness, we’ve got to understand there’s a thousand cameras on these players, there’s stump mics that are turned up. If we don’t want to see or hear that stuff then take away the cameras, so we only have a couple cameras, take the stump mics out and you won’t hear anything. Simple,” Johnson added.