Bolt blows up as Aussies almost cause Nitro boilover
Australia would have upstaged the Bolt All-Stars if not for a botched baton change at Nitro II, and the big man was clearly feeling the pressure.
All the Aussies had to do was avoid disqualification in the final event of Thursday's second Nitro Athletics showpiece - the mixed 4x100m relay - and they would have been crowned the night's winners.
But with long-jumper Fabrice Lapierre failing to receive the baton from Jack Hale within the allotted area on the second change-over, the Australians were DQed and relegated to second behind Bolt's team.
As the Aussies crept further and further ahead on the leaderboard, Bolt became more and more agitated.
It all started during the women's elimination mile when Camille Buscomb mistakenly thought she'd been knocked out of the race.
The event sees the last-placed runner eliminated after every lap, and Buscomb - and Aussie competing for Bolt's All-Stars - thought she was out after the first lap.
Buscomb stopped running even though she hadn't actually been eliminated, ruining any chance she had of victory.
And her captain was far from happy with officials for their handling of the mishap.
"Everyone should have stopped!" he argued with Channel 7's John Steffensen, albeit with a cheeky grin on his face.
The Jamaican superstar only half-heartedly argued the call, but was again infuriated when it looked as though the Aussies had got away with their illegal baton change at the end of the night.
Officials originally appeared to give the incident the all-clear before changing their decision about half an hour later.
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Bolt again remonstrated with Steffensen and demanded a disqualification.
"I've been doing track and field for years," he said.
"There's two yellow lines, one at the start and one at the end of the box and he was clearly outside."
The eight-time Olympic gold medallist could easily have let the incident slide for the sake of the home team and jovial crowd, but he continued his battle with officials after the cameras stopped rolling.
"I need to figure out what is going on there," he said.
"I don't know what happened - I thought if you got DQ'd you'd be out for sure or lose some points.
"But you can't not lose any points so I have to talk to the organisers because I am sure we won the night."
With Australia a relatively small player in the athletics game compared to some of the countries represented by Bolt's All Stars, the agitation he displayed when it looked like an upset was on the cards goes to show what an incredible performance it was from the locals.
The three-meet series concludes on Saturday, with the winner likely to take out overall honours.
