Awarding England six runs on the overthrow was a clear mistake, says Simon Taufel

It was one heck of a final at Lord’s! England and New Zealand had their moments in the game throughout and eventually, the boundary count decided the winner of the 2019 World Cup. But the moment which saw Ben Stokes unintentionally deflecting the ball to the boundary will go down in the cricketing folklore. It turned the game on its head in the last over and what should’ve been a win for the Kiwis, it went into the super over. England were awarded six runs of that particular delivery and it was a complete mishap on the part of the on-field umpires.

A former international umpire and member of the committee that presides over cricket’s rulebook Simon Taufel has now admitted that it was a grave error from the umpires. The incident happened when England needed nine runs off three balls. Stokes swatted the ball to deep mid-wicket which Martin Guptill and threw to the striker’s end in an attempt to run the batsman out.

But Stokes was back for the second run and he dived to save himself only to deflect the ball to the boundary with his bat. It was a game-changing moment as Kumar Dharmasena awarded England six runs. But if the cricket laws are considered, it was a clear mistake from him.

According to law 19.8 pertaining to Overthrow or wilful act of fielder which reads: If the boundary results from an overthrow or from the wilful act of a fielder, the runs scored shall be

— any runs for penalties awarded to either side

— and the allowance for the boundary

— and the runs completed by the batsmen, together with the run in progress if they had already crossed at the instant of the throw or act.

Stokes shouldn’t have been on the strike either

Ben Stokes and Adil Rashid hadn’t crossed each other for the second run when Martin Guptill threw the ball and the second run should’ve never been considered. To make things worse, Stokes shouldn’t have been on the strike either as the run wasn’t completed and Rashid should have faced the penultimate delivery of the match.

“It’s a clear mistake … it’s an error of judgment. They (England) should have been awarded five runs, not six. In the heat of what was going on, they thought there was a good chance the batsmen had crossed at the instant of the throw. Obviously, TV replays showed otherwise,” Simon Taufel said while speaking to foxsports.com.au on Monday.

The umpiring standards were questioned throughout the World Cup and the ICC should seriously look into the issue after two top umpires in Dharmasena and Marais Erasmus made a serious error and that too in a World Cup final.