Washington Sundar became the third Indian batter to be given out controversially in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) on Friday. The incident took place on the opening day of the fifth and final Test against Australia at the Sydney Cricket Ground.
Similar to Yashasvi Jaiswal‘s dismissal in Melbourne last month, Sundar too tried to pull a short of length delivery from Pat Cummins. While Cummins didn’t go for an DRS initially, wicketkeeper Alex Carey convinced his skipper to go upstairs after the on-field umpire Sharfuddoula Saikat remained unmoved.
Although there was a spike on the snickometre, third umpire Joel Wilson said on-air that he can see a gap on the bottom of the glove. He further took help of the side-on and slow-motion replays that clearly showed the spike on the snickometre was when the ball touched Sundar’s shirt. However, to everyone’s surprise, Wilson overturned the decision.
“Ball is very close to the glove and I cannot differentiate any gap between glove and ball and there is a spike as well as the ball got closer to the glove,” said Wilson. In utter disbelief, Sundar went to confront the umpire, but was asked to leave the field for 14.
Ex-cricketers slam dismissal
The decision didn’t go well with some of the former cricketers who took to social media to vent out their frustration. Former England captain Michael Vaughan called it an awful decision.
“No way is that OUT … that’s an awful decision …” Vaughan posted on X. Former India batter Robin Uthappa also minced no words for umpire Wilson. “I’m sorry, but that’s a crap decision! Sure, there was a spike, but from the side angle, there was a clear space between the ball and the glove. There is a lot of ambiguity with these kinds of decisions. The benefit must go to the batter,” Uthappa said.
