technology howler in IPL ~ DK hand directs bowler Mavi

Remember that Chepauk Test in Dec 1983 – Sunil Gavaskar made an unbeaten 236 – but did not open.  Anshuman Gaekwad opened with Navjot singh Sidhu.  Gaekwad was out for a duck and Dilip Vengsarkar too failed to open his account – both caught by Roger Harper off Malcolm Marshall – and Sunil Gavaskar who refused to open was at the crease at 0/2 .. .. something akin  - Rohit Sharma's decision to bat at No. 4 after Mumbai Indians' first two games was to play the anchor role in the middle order, it seemed to have flopped as soon as their innings started against Royal Challengers Bangalore. Umesh Yadav's two swinging deliveries removed Suryakumar Yadav and Ishan Kishan for golden ducks, and the captain was effectively opening the batting again.

As a 19 year-old bowling all-rounder, Shivam Mavi captured the attention of cricket fans bowling fast and dismissing Delhi Daredevils’s skipper, Gautam Gambhir in Monday’s match at the Eden Gardens, Kolkata. His accuracy and ability to clock up pace consistently has enamoured one and all. He’d previously burst into the scene with his impressive bowling performances in the 2018 U-19 World Cup, which India went on to win.  Today at Jaipur, Kolkata Knight Riders captain Dinesh Karthik stuck to this season's IPL trend of teams opting to bowl first, against Rajasthan Royals in Jaipur. Both teams, coming off wins in their previous games, remained unchanged.

As D Short and Ajinkya Rahane opened, KKR opened with Piyush Chawla and Kuldeep Yadav and kept things too tight.  Another spinner, Sunil Narine came on to bowl in the power play and was hit for 4 fours by Rahane.  Then came Nitish Rana, not a regular bowler, but who has dismissed Kohli and de Villiers.  Off the 3^rd ball, Kartik went for an unnecessary review as Rana’s delivery to Short, hit the bat, pad, ground and everything before going on to Dinesh Kartik and another ball later, DK did a brilliant  back-handed flick onto the stumps off his right hand; Rahane was done by the smart work of the keeper.

Elsewhere, Surrey head coach Michael Di Venuto has left the door ajar for David Warnerand Steven Smith to play for the county during their ball-tampering bans if the ECB were to permit the pair to be available for the English domestic game. Di Venuto is a former Australia batting coach, having held the role from 2013 to 2016, and said it would be "mad" not to consider signing either of the duo should it be allowed. The bans handed down by Cricket Australia only cover Australian international and domestic cricket, although any position in the county game would need ECB sign-off.

"From an Australian perspective, it is probably important that they play a bit of cricket at some stage," Di Venuto said. "I don't know if they are allowed to play in this competition. I know what it states in their sanctions that they can't play domestic cricket in Australia. "If they are in the right mental state to play cricket and the ECB will have to allow it to start with, then we'd be mad not to look at some of the world's best players potentially playing."

At Jaipur, today, in the last over, DK was too critical putting pressure on young Mavi, literally directing him with hand directions which did not go unnoticed. He directed for bowling wide off, a bouncer, full pitched one and more .. .. IPL is reliant on technology and there have been some good decisions aided by technology – yet there can be howlers too .. .. ..

It might not have had much of a bearing on the result of the match, but the third umpire might have looked at the wrong replay when the on-field officials turned to him to check on a no-ball during the match between Mumbai Indians and Royal Challengers Bangalore. Jasprit Bumrah is no stranger to bowling no-balls - his costliest one coming in last year's Champions Trophy final - but he got away without scrutiny when he dismissed Umesh Yadav, the eighth Royal Challengers batsman to fall, on Tuesday. The on-field umpire immediately asked to see if he had overstepped. The replay shown, though, has Umesh at the non-striker's end, and the heel of Bumrah's front foot lands well inside the crease. The commentators were surprised that it was even checked. "No need to go [to the third umpire] for that," commentator Sunil Gavaskar said on air.

It went unnoticed that Umesh was in the picture at the non-striker's end until Twitter user @ronak_169 brought it to ESPNcricinfo's notice. While this was not significant to the result - Royal Challengers were 137 for 7, chasing 214, with only 13 balls left - it once again raises the possibility of this human error in more critical stages of the match. Nor is this the first time that the third umpire has ruled on a no-ball when watching the wrong replay.  It is reported that this  kind of error often occurs when the replay operator clicks twice, thus going to the previous ball and missing the ball in question. In this case, Umesh was indeed at the non-striker's end one ball before he got out. There is no plausible reason for this to be anything other than an innocent human mistake, but such an error has the potential to attain major significance in a tight situation.

In this particular instance, perhaps the third umpire could have been more vigilant. Perhaps checking who is at the non-striker's end when checking for no-balls can be added to the third umpire's protocols, but by no means is it an exhaustive check: in this case, for example, if the previous ball had been a dot played out by Umesh, a wrong replay would have shown Virat Kohli at the non-striker's end.

With regards – S. Sampathkumar

18^th Apr 2018

PS: majorly reproduced from cricinfo.