AB de Villiers' take on poor umpiring during the 2nd ODI against India
The South African captain AB de Villiers has said that he is not the type of captain who will question the umpires decisions, reports ESPNcricinfo. The poor umpiring show in the India-South Africa series continued but this time India was lucky to get one crucial decision turn to their side.
Batsman Farhaan Behardien was given out caught behind off Harbhajan Singh's delivery of a nick by umpire Vineet Kulkarni. But when snicko detector was brought into play, it showed no sign off batsman edging the ball.
Speaking during the post-match press conference of the second one-day international match in Indore, De Villiers made it clear that he never comments on the officials roles.
"I don't like to comment on umpires decisions, I like to keep it to myself. Sometimes they get it right and sometimes they get it wrong and that's part of the game. Whether Behardien was out or not I am not sure and it's not up to me to decide that," De Villiers said.
He continued: "We are not the kind of cricket team and I am not the kind of captain to go and publicly criticise the umpires. They give it their best out there. They get some right, they get some wrong. I don't think it changed the game. We had opportunities to win and we didn't take it. That's part of sport."
Following the first Twenty20 international in Dharamsala, India's captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni gave a statement on the decisions made during the match and said: "We did not have quite a few decisions going our way and sometimes these can change the match, it could have been different if we could have got Duminy out early.”
Dhoni reaction came after umpire Kulkarni, who officiating his 7th T20 match, turned down Axar Patel’s appeals to get JP Duminy out when South Africa still needed 96 off 48 balls. Duminy got a further reprieve off Bhuvneshwar Kumar’s bowling, capitalising on his two extra lives to take his team home for a last-over victory.
After the defeats in the Twenty20 international series and in the first game of the five-match ODI series, hosts India showed their unhappiness with umpire Kulkarni for what the home team felt was poor officiating. According to the reports, team manager Vinod Phadke said that he was going to complain about the decision-making at the end of the series.
"I have not seen the captain's report, but I am going to mention him in my report, it is obvious to everybody that the umpiring has not been good," Phadke was quoted saying by ESPNcricinfo. But soon, International Cricket Council charged him for making these "inappropriate comments."
The five-match ODI series is levelled now at 1-1 with three more matches to go. Next match will be played in Rajkot on October 18.