Australian team and their captain Pat Cummins capped off a brilliant winter in 2023 with a World Cup trophy, which already had a World Test Championship and an Ashes series retention to show for. Australia began their tournament with two losses but 9 games later they found themselves on the podium after beating the best team in the competition, India and Cummins had the privilege of receiving the trophy from the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
However, the video of PM Modi handing the trophy to Cummins became a rage as the Australian captain was left alone on the podium. Modi and Australian deputy PM Richard Marles left the stage after handing the trophy to Cummins and the former then shook hands with all the Australian players. Until this happened, Cummins was on the podium with the trophy alone waiting for his teammates to join him.
The fans were divided on the same issue and now a couple of weeks after the final, Glenn Maxwell has reacted to the video saying that Cummins handled the situation brilliantly and not made a big deal out of it. Maxwell admitted that the wait for Cummins felt more that it was but he was respectful and dealt with it outstandingly well.
“It was quite funny watching the videos of the post-match presentation where he shook Modi’s hand and was stuck there on the podium,” Maxwell said speaking to The Age.
“It felt like that lasted for about 10 minutes, him just standing there with the trophy waiting for the group to come on. But he actually dealt with it with class. He didn’t make a big song and dance about it, [he] just thought ‘you know what, I’ll wait here, be respectful.’ Not everyone would’ve dealt with that like he did,” he added.
Maxwell and Cummins were at the helm for Australia in two of their biggest partnerships in the tournament including the outrageous chase against Afghanistan where the hard-hitting all-rounder struck a record 201* while being on a single leg, effectively.