Sri Lanka asked to remove flag from Lord's balcony after protest against no-ball

06/13/2016

Things turned bizarre at the Lord's yesterday after the Sri Lankans unfurled the national flag from their balcony to protest the 'unjust' umpiring calls they have received in the series. The move came after Alex Hales was given not out off a legal delivery that was called a no-ball by the umpire.

Sri Lanka have not been having a great time in this tour of England with the side already 2-0 down and facing a whitewash with the third Test firmly in England's pocket. But the islanders have been aggrieved with the number of umpiring calls that have gone against them throughout the series. The Lankans were on the verge of an outburst after quite a few close calls went against them on Sunday at the end of which England was happy to declare and set Sri Lanka a target of 330 runs on the final day with 10 wickets in hand.

But what broke the camel's back was Alex Hales' reprieve after he was bowled by Nuwan Pradeep, when the batsman was batting at 58. Umpire Rod Tucker called it a no-ball although replayed clearly showed that a part of his foot was behind the crease. Hales went on to make 94 and helped England set the daunting target for the Sri Lankan team.

The Lankan team responded by putting up the Sri Lankan national flag in their balcony, protesting the decision and apparently to “lift the spirits up”.

"We put the flag up to immediately support the boys, to lift their spirits up after things were going wrong, one after the other. There was a sentiment that we had the poor end of the rulings," Charith Senanayake, Sri Lanka's manager, said, reported Cricbuzz.

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However, the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) rules do not permit the display of any flags or banners at Lord's. The flag, which was on display for over an hour, was finally taken down at the request of the MCC officials.

"The MCC made a very kind request that their policy is not to allow any flags to be displayed," Senanayake said. "Given the relationship between us and MCC - they spoke to me and I took the flag down."

Sri Lankan coach Graham Ford also defended the move saying, "At that stage we felt the boys were fighting hard and we wanted to show our support from the dressing room to boost their morale --only for us to find out that’s not the done thing and we had to take it down”.

Ford also revealed that Tucker had apologised to the Sri Lanka captain Angelo Mathews for his mistake.

"He got the news from the third umpire and he apologised to Angelo. It was very good of him to have done that and we move on."

The incident also prompted Ford to call for all no-ball decisions to be taken by the third umpire.

"The ICC have to look at it. It seems strange with the technology available that you can still get a line call wrong," the South African said, reported AFP.

"The best solution is for the umpires to worry about what’s happening down the other end and let technology look after the line call,” he said.

Our view

The suggestion to refer all no-ball calls to the third umpire appears sound and would be a welcome inclusion to the game. For a sport that already sends half the crowd into a stupor midway with repeated interruptions for referral by the field umpires to check for the no-ball (at least in the IPL), an automatic referral where the third umpire interrupts play only during contentious calls would actually serve to keep the ball rolling.

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