IND vs ENG | Twitter reacts as rare rule denies England 2019 final's overthrow benefits after Rohit's lazy attempt

‌India expectedly weaved a web of spin around England on the first day of the five-Test series on Thursday to have the visitors down and out at 155/7 midway through the second session. The spin trio of Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, and Axar Patel scalped two wickets each while Jasprit Bumrah dealt the latest blow by getting rid of Rehan Ahmed with a brilliant leg-cutter. However, amidst all the chaos, the hosts did allow England some freebies, the most blatant of which occurred at the end of the 47th over with Rohit Sharma to blame.

Rehan had managed to flick a Bumrah yorker towards deep square log and sprinted across calling for a two with Mohammed Siraj approaching the red cherry. Ben Stokes decided to go through with the call and was in danger as the throw came in from the deep but with no one covering the stumps, a lack of direct hit meant the skipper survived the potentially dangerous play. To add salt to India's wounds, Rohit had been standing by at mid-off with no attempt to back up and ended up reacting too late with the ball racing past him towards the boundary leading the umpire to signal six runs.

However, as a slight reprieve for the hosts, an interference by the third-umpire saw England being stripped of an extra run considering the batters hadn't crossed each other at the moment the ball left Siraj's hands. The rule was famously applied incorrectly during the 2019 World Cup final when no such retrospective action was taken and ended up handing England their first ever World Cup title. Twitter was quick to both bash the Indian captain for his callous approach while engaging in a fierce debate about the rules.