Former New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori has asked for the on-field wide calls to be up for verification in the Decision Review System. Vettori raised the issue after multiple contentious wide calls made by standing umpires in an IPL 2022 league stage game on May 2 night.
The 19th over of Rajasthan Royals’ game against Kolkata Knight Riders in Mumbai bowled by Prasidh Krishna saw umpire Nitin Pandit call three wides even as batters Nitish Rana and Rinku Singh moved around the crease, and the pacer adjusted his line.
Those calls got even the calm and composed RR skipper Sanju Samson visibly frustrated, as he felt let down by a rigid application of rules from Pandit despite seeing Krishna only react to KKR batters moving around peerlessly close to the white line.
For one of these wides, Samson went for a review on the catch, considered a mark of protest against the umpiring by Vettori, who said even the Royals’ captain was aware that the batter hadn’t nicked the ball, but he still reviewed it so that the television official sees how doubtful the wide call was.
“I don’t think there was any thought of it actually being out. Absolutely [players should be allowed to review wides]. The players should be able to decide in such crucial matters,”
Vettori said on ESPNcricinfo’s IPL special ‘T20 Time:Out’.
“Today it is a little bit different where it always looked like KKR are going to win. But we have sat here so many times and seen decisions go against bowlers that are so close and the umpire has got it wrong.
So therefore the players should have some avenues towards rectifying those mistakes. That’s why DRS was brought in: to rectify mistakes. I would like to see that happen. And players are very good judges of that. They get it right more often than not,”
he added.
Vettori’s co-panellist on the ESPNcricinfo show, Imran Tahir, still an active player, agreed with his Kiwi spin counterpart and said the rules for umpiring the wides and no-balls shouldn’t be rigid so that the game balances out for the bowler.
There were two contrasting wide calls in that Krishna over. For the first, the umpire decided against calling it an extra when Rana took his back leg across within his stance, and the pacer reacted with a wide yorker that nearly touched the line. But then, the same umpire deemed it a wide when Rana almost stepped outside the playing surface while trying to ramp a slower delivery to the leg-side.
Seeing this pattern, the head of Royals’ support staff Kumar Sangakkara called for more consistency from the umpires. The former Sri Lanka skipper believes it’s about time that the umpires showcase more leniency and understanding towards the bowlers in how they read a batter’s movement around the crease and project its impact on that wide line. The wide line can’t be considered stationary if the batter goes well outside the off-stump to play a ramp.
“You can’t create a wide but you can destroy a wide by moving around the crease. Before the delivery is made, any movement you make becomes the starting point for the wide line to start moving,”
Sangakkara was quoted as saying by ESPNcricinfo, terming such calls “one-percenters” that may have counted in a tighter game than the one RR played versus KKR.
Losing the game due to an indifferent batting performance, the Royals are placed third in the IPL 2022 points table with six wins and four losses. They next play on May 7 against Punjab Kings.
