New Delhi, India

After leading Rajasthan Royals (RR) to a three-run win over his former franchise Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in IPL 2023, on Wednesday (April 12), R Ashwin was fined 25 per cent of his match fees for breaching IPL Code of Conduct. Ashwin, who was awarded the Player-of-the-Match for his 30 (22) and 2 for 25 (4) in Chennai, criticised select decisions made by the umpires in the ongoing season and, thus, paid a heavy price for it.

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'Some of the decisions have left me a little flummoxed'

After the match, Ashwin said, "I'm quite surprised the umpires changed the ball for dew on their own. It's never happened before and I'm quite surprised." He added, "Some of the decisions in this year's IPL on the field have left me a little flummoxed, to be honest. It left me flummoxed in a good or bad way because what you need is a little bit of balance. We're going as a bowling team and we're not asking for the ball to be changed. But the ball was changed on the umpire's accord. 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," Ashwin concluded.

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Also Read: IPL 2023: 'You're never safe with MS Dhoni'- Sanju Samson reacts after RR's close win over CSK

For his comments, Ashwin admitted to the Level 1 Offence under Article 2.7 of the IPL’s Code of Conduct. It is to be noted that Article 2.7 states, "Public criticism of, or inappropriate comment in relation to an incident occurring in a Match or any Player, Team Official, Match Official or Team participating in any Match, irrespective of when such criticism or inappropriate comment is made."

In addition, RR captain Sanju Samson was penalised with INR 12 crore fine for his side's slow over-rate in their defence of 176 vs CSK. Being asked to bat first, RR posted 175-8 and restricted MS Dhoni's CSK for 172 for 6 to win by three runs and top the points table.