Creepy Cricket Player Attempts to Ask Reporter Out During Live Interview, Gets Denied

Blocked.

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Complex Original

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We’re going to go out on a limb here and say that female sports reporters are probably subjected to stuff like this all…the…time. But it’s (thankfully) pretty rare to see it take place right there in front of everyone on live TV.

During a recent cricket tournament called The Big Bash League in Australia, Melbourne Renegades player Chris Gayle—wait, the same guy who has a strip club inside of his house? Yup, that guy—was interviewed by female Ten Sports reporter Melanie McLaughlin. And after she asked him a question about his play, he responded by saying that he was playing so well because he wanted to do an interview with her. He then followed it up by asking her to go out for drinks with him after the match.

“I wanted to come and have an interview with you,” he said. “That’s the reason why I’m here. Just to see your eyes for the first time. It’s nice. Hopefully we win this game and we can have a drink after. Don’t blush, baby.”

“I’m not blushing,” she said, before trying to steer the interview back in the right direction.

Gayle wouldn’t let it go, though, and after answering a question about an injury, he tried to bring the conversation back to McLaughlin’s eyes, which prompted her to quickly end the interview.

Later, BBL organizers released a statement on Gayle’s actions during the interview:

“I heard Chris’ comments and they’re disrespectful and simply inappropriate. We’ll certainly be talking to him and the Renegades about it. This league is all about its appeal to kids, families and females. There’s just no place in the BBL—or, for that matter, cricket anywhere—for that sort of behavior.”

But it doesn’t seem like Gayle thinks he did anything wrong. While he didn’t respond directly to the controversy that his comments have caused, he did retweet this opinion from Piers Morgan:

SMH. Sadly, we’ve seen more awkward athlete-female reporter interviews than this one, but McLaughlin still deserves credit for how she handled herself here.

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[via SportsGrid]

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