'That’s just pathetic officiating' - Ricky Ponting fumes after David Warner gets a no-ball reprieve

The high-profile Ashes is currently up in Australia where players are giving in their all to maintain dominance. However, some ordinary umpiring in the game fumed former Australian skipper Ricky Ponting and he came up to speak about it in detail. Ponting labeled the umpiring as ‘pathetic’ wherein David Warner was given out on Day 2 of the opening Ashes Test.

It was a no-ball from Ben Stokes wherein Warner was signalled out and when the replayed came up for all, it clearly showed that Stokes has overstepped. Stokes, who returned to the international circuit after a long time, placed the delivery while Warner was on 17 runs and the error on his part gave the Australian batter a reprieve.

It also has to be noted that the English all-rounder overstepped every delivery which led to Warner’s dismissal but not even a single one was signalled. The continuous errors from the umpire’s end fumed Ponting a lot.

“If someone upstairs is supposed to be checking these and they haven’t decided that any of those are a no-ball, that’s just pathetic officiating as far as I’m concerned,” said Ponting while speaking to Channel 7.

“It led to what we saw late in the over. If he’d have been called for a no-ball the first one he bowled, then of course he’s going to drag his foot back. I’m not sure what’s happened. I’m keen to hear why it hasn’t happened earlier,” he added.

Ben Stokes oversteps while bowling to David Warner on day two of Ashes

.@AlisonMitchell has breaking news about the no-balls not being called by the third umpire:

"What happened before the start of this Test match is the technology that's provided to the ICC to enable (checking no-balls) went down."#Ashes pic.twitter.com/6RjK5nQCGv

— 7Cricket (@7Cricket) December 9, 2021

Just before the event, Warner had edged twice which went through slips before he went to make a sturdy stand with Marnus Labuschagne of over 100 runs. On day one of the opening Ashes game, the hosts wrapped up visitors for just 147 runs where Pat Cummins’ five-for turned out to be significant.

Losing Marcus Harris early on, Warner and Labuschagne played a great brand of cricket to put Australia on top. Labuschagne looked a lot in rhythm while smashing six fours and two sixes on his way to scoring 74 runs.