“Sounds more like sledge” - Dinesh Karthik comes up with a cheeky reaction to WWE India’s “freakin” compliment

Indian wicketkeeper-batter Dinesh Karthik has come up with a cheeky reaction to a post from WWE India’s X handle in which the cricketer was referred to as Dinesh “Freakin” Karthik. According to the Tamil Nadu stumper, the compliment sounds more like a sledge.

There’s an interesting story behind WWE India's post on Karthik. Ahead of Team India finalizing their World Cup 2023 squad on Thursday, September 28, a post from Karthik on his X account went viral, in which he predicted that off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin would be part of India’s 15-member World Cup squad.

After the Indian cricketer’s prediction came true, Karthik’s Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) took to their X account and shared a post in which a WWE wrester’s face was swapped with that of the veteran keeper-batter.

RCB uploaded the post with a screenshot of DK’s viral post on Ashwin and captioned it “VISIONARY”, also sharing a crystal ball emoji along with it.

WWE India re-shared RCB’s post on Karthik and captioned it:

“Visionary, Revolutionary, Dinesh “Freakin” Karthik!”

While Karthik himself found it as more of a sledge, some users responded on the post and explained that “freakin” is the catchphrase of WWE superstar Seth Rollins.

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What Dinesh Karthik posted about Ravichandran Ashwin

September 28 was the last day for teams to finalize their 15-man ICC World Cup 2023 squads. Any changes from hereon will require approval from the ICC.

Ahead of the official announcement of Ashwin replacing all-rounder Axar Patel in India’s World Cup squad, Karthik took to his X account and wrote:

“R ASHWIN will be there in TEAM INDIA world cup squad. Don't ask me how. Its just a feeling. Lets see how well this tweet ages.”

Ashwin replaced Axar in India’s World Cup 2023 squad after the latter failed to recover from a left quadriceps strain he sustained during the Asia Cup 2023 Super 4 match against Bangladesh. The latter missed the Asia Cup final as well as the three-match ODI series against Australia.

Ashwin was handed a comeback for the ODI series and impressed, claiming four wickets in two matches. Both captain Rohit Sharma and coach Rahul Dravid had indirectly hinted in press conferences that Ashwin would replace Axar if the latter does not recover in time.

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India's World Cup 2023 squad: Rohit Sharma (c), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya (vc), Ravindra Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, Ravichandran Ashwin.