Chennai: After the first ODI between India and West Indies, skipper Virat Kohli had said he was miffed with on-field umpire Shaun George’s late run-out call involving all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja. Kohli felt that George changed his original not out decision only after the West Indies players, prompted by “people sitting outside” appealed to him to review the incident.
However, it has now come to fore that third umpire Rod Tucker had told George to refer the decision “upstairs”.
According to a report in ESPNcricinfo, immediately after George had turned down the initial run-out appeal by Roston Chase, Tucker asked the former, via the radio that wires all the match officials, to refer it “upstairs” as the decision was “tight”.
The report stated that all this took place at the same time when replays of the incident were broadcast on TV. Tucker, after seeing the replays, decided to intervene and told George — the on-field umpire — to refer it to the third umpire.
Tucker then relayed to George that Jadeja was indeed short of his crease.
The incident took place in the 48th over of India’s innings, when Jadeja went for a quick single but the fielder affected a direct hit at the striker’s end. On-field umpire George did not give him out even though Jadeja was short of the crease as replays would later show.
“We would have got 15-20 runs more had something not happened out there. The fielder asked about the run-out and the umpire said not out. These dismissals end there. The people sitting outside cannot tell the fielder and they can’t ask the umpire about reviewing the run-out,” Kohli said at the post-match presentation on Sunday after India the match by eight wickets to hand West Indies a 1-0 lead in the three-match series.
“I have never seen this in cricket. I don’t know where the rules are. The referee and the umpire have to take it up and decide. The people sitting outside the field shouldn’t dictate what happens on the field and that’s exactly what happened there,” he added.
However, West Indies skipper Kieron Pollard said that the right decision was taken. “At the end of the day, the right decision was made and that’s the most important thing for me,” he said.
