Liton Das involved in controversial dismissal in Bangladesh-Windies T20I
What's the Story?
A huge no-ball controversy took place during the 3rd T20I between Windies and Bangladesh. Chasing Windies' total of 191 to win the series, Bangladesh were off to a flier in the Sher-e-Bangla cricket stadium. However, some controversial calls from on-field umpires led to an animated confrontation between the Windies team and the match officials.
The Heart of the Matter
Windies batted first in the 3rd T20I and scored 190 runs before losing their 10 wickets in 19.2 overs. Evin Lewis' blistering knock helped the visitors set a huge target for the Bangladeshi side. Openers Tamim Iqbal and Liton Das started the innings for the home side. Tamim departed after being run out in the 2nd over which invited Soumya Sarkar to the pitch.
Things looked normal until the third over of Bangladesh innings which was bowled by Oshane Thomas. Liton Das smashed the first ball of the over for a six and smashed another boundary on the third ball. Thomas bowled a no-ball after the 4th ball which was dispatched to the boundary by Das. He struck a six on the following free hit to mount up the pressure on Thomas.
Thomas made a brilliant comeback on the last ball of the over and dismissed Liton Das as the right-handed batsman hit the ball straight into the hands of the mid-off fielder. However, the umpire ruled it as a no-ball but the replays showed that Thomas' foot had some portion behind the line. The Windies fielders saw this on the big screen and questioned the umpire's decision which led to the decision being overturned.
However, the game was halted as the matter went to the fourth umpire, Jeff Crowe. As the batsman had heard the call of a no-ball before playing the aggressive shot, and so the officials decided to turn the decision in the favor of the batsman once again as Das was called back on the ground.
Carlos Braithwaite wanted to review it but the decision stayed as a no ball. To add salt to Windies' wound, Bangladesh were awarded a free hit and Sarkar sent the ball out of the boundary to complete a 30-run over.
In Case You Did Not Know...
Bangladesh is hosting the Windies for a 3-match T20I series with the teams winning 1 match each of the first 2 matches. Both the teams were fined for slow over rate in the 2nd match of the series and also a lot of umpire decisions were overturned which just brought the wrong kind of attention towards this series.
What's Next?
The ICC needs to look in these matters of on-field no balls. We had earlier seen the umpires missing a lot of no-balls during India vs Australia Test and this latest incident would have surely rung warning bells for the ICC.