A TV grab of the controversial replay. Yadav is at the same end as Bumrah.
Wrong Replay
THE IPL broadcasters suffered a faux pas during the Mumbai Indians-Royal Challengers Bangalore match at the Wankhede Stadium on Tuesday night by providing the third-umpire with the replay of the wrong ball while the umpires checked if Jasprit Bumrah had overstepped the line. It came late in the Bangalore innings after Bumrah had dismissed Yadav. And the on-field umpires wanted to check for a no-ball, which they tend to do often at the fall of a wicket, and especially since the bowler was Bumrah, a chronic over-stepper.
But it turns out the third-umpire didn’t see the replay of Yadav’s wicket. In fact, Yadav was found to be at the non-striker’s end in the one that KN Ananthapadmanabhan was shown. And Bumrah’s front foot was well inside the crease.
This broadcasting error was first brought to light on Twitter by @ronak_169 who wrote “From 4:32-5:02 you can see clearly umesh yadav gets out and it’s kohli and his mrf bat on Monday strike. But when they check for the no ball it’s umesh yadav and his SG bat on non strike” with a Hotstar link to a video of the incident.
Deja vu
This wasn’t the first time the dismissed batsman had been found at the wrong end while the third umpire was checking for a no-ball in the IPL. Back in 2011, Amit Mishra’s foot was found to be well within legal confines after he’d dismissed Sachin Tendulkar at Wankhede.
Only that, viewers saw Tendulkar standing next to Mishra at the bowling end in one of the replays. A month or so later in the Caribbean, West Indian umpire Gregory Brathwaite was shown the replay of a delivery where MS Dhoni was at the non-striker’s end while he was checking to see if Fidel Edwards had over-stepped the line while dismissing MS Dhoni.
The gaffe had been confirmed by the ICC and acknowledged by IMG Media who were handling the broadcast for that series and for the IPL back then. Sources in the Indian camp back then had revealed to this paper that while recovering the replay of the delivery generally took not more than three seconds usually, in this case there had been a 40-second delay before it was made available. IMG Media had admitted that it was a case of a “human error” compounded by a senior replay operative having to return home due to a bereavement.
Human error
The human error here is just a case of the operator clicking more than once or maybe even the sensitivity of his touchpad. For, it immediately then skips to the previous ball. And it doesn’t always mean that he’s erred if the batsman who’s out is found to be at the non-striker’s end.
The dismissed batsman after all could easily have been on strike the previous ball too, meaning the third umpire could never know for certain that he’s actually being provided with the delivery in question every single time. And considering that the responsibility is completely that of the broadcaster, there perhaps is no way of completely eliminating the scope of human error. There could always be an over-sensitive touchpad or an inexperienced operator manning the replay like it happened in the Caribbean seven years ago.