Sledging gets milder and milder but is it still too much for gentleman's game?

ADELAIDE: As they watched Mohammed Siraj and Travis Head have a go at each other during the Adelaide Test, there must have been more than a few chuckles in the commentary boxes at the stadium.

- Ashish Magotra

We could've imagined it, but it wouldn't exactly have been out of character for the send-off and the retort were little more than child's play to them.

After all, to many around the world, Australians getting outraged by sledging is probably an all-time classic joke; the kind that never stops being funny. They would have chuckled too.

It has taken time and a lot of incidents for the Australians to earn such a reputation and to most players themselves, it doesn't matter. But the crowd started booing Siraj when he was bowling, when he was fielding, when he was standing at the boundary line. Even when he came out to bat on Sunday, the pacer was at the receiving end of the crowd's booing and a few "Siraj is a w****r" chants.

This, though, pales in comparison to what the Aussies have dished out over the years. Few in India will forget the Javagal Srinath-Ricky Ponting confrontation in 1999.

It was the second day of the Boxing Day Test in 1999 and Srinath bowled a short ball to Ponting. The batter went for the pull, but the ball flew off the top edge and into the helmet.

The Indian pacer walked over to check on Ponting's well-being, but he was met with a response that shocked him. The Australian waved the bat at Srinath's face and asked him to "go back and effing bowl".

Former Australia skipper Ian Chappell, in the commentary box, attributed Ponting's response to "a flash of anger that you get when you get hit".