The standard of umpiring in IPL 2022 hasn’t been very high, but yesterday during a game between Lucknow Supergiants and Delhi Capitals, one of the decisions made by the TV umpire regarding a close save at the boundary line looked completely wrong and it was pointed out by the New Zealand and Rajasthan Royals allrounder Jimmy Neesham.
It was Krunal Pandya who was the fielder trying to save the boundary on that occasion and what happened was that when he dived for the first time, he pushed the boundary rope back from its usual position and then collected the ball from an area where the boundary rope should have originally been, if not pushed back.
However, even while collecting the ball, Krunal’s shoe seemed to be touching the boundary rope, although the boundary rope was pushed back already because of Krunal’s first dive. It was a clear case where a four should have been given to the batting side by the TV umpire because there were too many things going against the fielder there.
Jimmy Neesham couldn’t believe third umpire didn’t give it a four
What Jimmy Neesham pointed out was not the fact that Krunal’s shoe was touching the rope because it was secondary. First of all, the fact that the boundary rope was pushed back from its original position was itself enough to declare it a four because the fielder collected the ball from the original position of the rope.
My understanding is that you can’t move the rope back and have the ball touch where the rope originally was. So that Krunal stop is clearly 4, no? #IPL2022
— Jimmy Neesham (@JimmyNeesh) May 1, 2022
That decision of the TV umpire costed Delhi Capitals two runs and in a close game where they lost just by 6 runs, those two runs might have been very crucial because apart from that, some marginal wide ball calls were there as well, which went against Delhi Capitals.
The relationship between the Delhi Capitals skipper Rishabh Pant and the umpires have been a bit rocky this IPL and a lot of times, there have been debates between Pant and umpires, none bigger than the one in the game against Rajasthan Royals, where Pant was literally calling his team back from the ground as he was miffed with an umpiring call.
