14 Most weird rules in Cricket: You better believe them

14 Most weird rules in Cricket: You better believe them: “Weirdo” that’s probably a word none of us are unfamiliar with. All of us have or have been referred with that term sometime or the other, be it our dressing sense, or attitude. Cricket also has many rules which are quite perplexing and unusual. Many times on the pitch (and after the game) we have come to discuss whether a controversial situation should be allowed or not. A deep enough understanding of the laws forms the answers to those tricky questions. And here we list some unconventional and strikingly odd rules – 14 Most weird rules in Cricket: You better believe them: 1. Ariel Stoppage = Dead Ball: Whether technology is a boon or a bane will always be a haunting topic for every generation to discuss. But cricket has an answer to this question. If a ball hits the spider cam floating over the ground, then it is considered a dead ball even if its a sure shot six or catch. Check this Champions League game. Similarly, Docklands stadium in Australia is covered with roof, so if a ball hits the roof it is given as a dead ball. This charity game between Australia and World XI saw this bizarre occurrence. 2. Rare Happenings, Rare Rule: In an attempt to save a six, the fielder can jump and stop the ball going over the boundary. If the ball still manages to cross the boundary rope then he cannot go outside the boundary and volley the ball back in, even if he jumps to stop the ball. It will be considered as six. The rule came into play after this one of a kind incident. 3. Spirit of Cricket: You cannot have more than 2 fielders behind the square on the leg-side in all forms of the game. This is done keeping in mind the spirit of the game. Because the bowler can have fielders on both side behind the batsman and can keep on delivering bouncers which could cause physical harm to the batsmen. 4. An unexpected call up!: After a batsman is declared out, the captain of the fielding team can withdraw the appeal but only with the consent of the umpire. For example when a batsman collides with a fielder and suffering major pain, is left stranded in the middle while the opposing team removes the bails to run him out. To be adamant on such a mode of dismissal is not in accordance with the ethics of cricket. The controversial Ian Bell saga relating to this in the 2011 series was a well documented one. 5. Cricket has its own penalty decision: If the cricket ball touches the helmet of the keeper kept on the ground, irrespective of the force it touches the helmet with, it is declared as PENALTY and the batting team is awarded with 5 runs. Check this incident between Pakistan and Sri Lanka: 6. LBW or BBW: A batsman is pronounced to be LBW (leg before wicket) even if the ball makes contact with the body of the batsman not necessarily the leg effectively making it a body before wicket (BBW) rule. The only criteria is his part of the body should in front of the stumps. Tendulkar’s weird LBW decision by Darrel Hair is a classic example: 7. Out or not out, one should appeal: The umpire can declare the batsman out only if the fielding team appeals. So it doesn’t matter if the batsman is out or not, one should always appeal. There are several cases where the umpire knew the batsman was out but the fielding team didn’t appeal and thus did not give the decision. 8. Double bat: A batsman can be declared out if he deliberately strikes the ball with the bat more than once. Inadvertent or involuntarily double strikes are given not out though. 9. I bet you do not know this!: Appealing. (© Getty Images) There is nothing called “appealing for caught behind” or “appealing for LBW”. The appeal covers all forms of dismissal, so the fielding team can appeal thinking the batsman is out caught behind only to have the batsman declared leg-before-wicket. 10. Leg byes!! are you serious: Consider a hypothetical situation: A bowler delivers a bouncer which hits the batsman’s helmet while he is trying to avoid it and flies off over the short third man boundary, it will be signalled six leg byes. But why will the umpire signal Leg byes and why not a six – since the ball never touched the ground before it crossed the boundary? Leg byes will be awarded in this instance because the striker was hit while taking evasive action to avoid the ball. It is not possible to deliberately score a six leg byes. A normal six can only be scored if the ball has made contact with the bat or the hands or gloves holding it. 12. Rules are rules: Take for instance, the rule of mowing the grass on the pitch before the start of play, every single day. Obviously, this rule works well on pitches with a decent covering of grass. Believe it or not though, the pitch that doesn’t boast of even a strand of grass is mowed too, every single day. In such cases, the blade is set a little high so that it doesn’t touch the surface at all, for the blade can damage the grass-less pitch. Nobody seems to be too bothered about asking: What is the purpose of this mowing? Why waste manpower, energy and time indulging in such a senseless act? 13. Lunch in the morning?: How many times have you had lunch at 10:45 am? Well, whenever we play in the East of India, we take a break for lunch at 11 am, for the match starts at 8:30 am. Since on the last day, the match starts 15 minutes earlier, we have lunch at 10:45 am. Isn’t that the most silly thing? Are we not taking the English and their rules far too seriously? Matches in England start only at 11 am and hence the first session is rightly followed by lunch and then tea around 3:30-4 pm after the second session. But since we start so early, why can’t we have our own set of breaks? We must not allow rules to trump our basic common sense. 14. Have some mercy: Not even a couple of years ago a rule was introduced which prohibited players from taking a break from play for reasons other than an injury or illness. But this led to something very comical in an Under-16 match. A kid needed to relieve himself urgently but the umpires, adhering to the rules, refused flatly. The kid requested his captain to field with 10 players for an over but the captain didn’t pay heed either. After a couple of overs when it was simply impossible to control the call any longer, the kid lowered his trousers and relieved himself on the boundary ropes. After that incident, players and umpires decided to find a way around the rule. Now, instead of asking for a loo-break, players ask for medical attention despite them and the umpire knowing that the real reason is something else.