VIDEO | Steve Smith argues with Nigel Llong as umpire denies leg-byes after his “evasive action”
Umpiring has been a case study over the last few years but Steve Smith was clearly not a happy man after his attempt to evade a ball and subsequently, running for a single wasn’t counted as a legal ball. Smith argued with Nigel Llong for some time and was fuming over the “perception” judgement.
In the first Test in Perth, Smith was treated with some short stuff from Neil Wagner and fell prey to the strategy in both the innings. The template was set already and as soon as the former Aussie skipper entered the ground today in Melbourne, Wagner was back at the top of his mark, and bowling, well, it was no different.
On the fifth ball of the 26th over, Smith, who was ready to counter Wagner with a newly-devised angular pull shot, was left to face a delivery that rose from the back of good length area, ensuring Smith was late to react. It was not typical of Smith but the very excellent Wagner had a plan of landing the ball towards the leg-side which meant Smith was unsure how to evade.
As the ball moved in the air, Smith moved a bit towards his off stump, but the ball struck him high on the body before trickling behind the wicket. As per MCC Law 20.4.2.5, "a leg bye can only be scored if the umpire is happy that a shot has been attempted or the batsman has attempted to evade the ball", which means it became a matter of perception.
Llong concluded that Smith had left the ball and let it strike him rather than "try and avoid being hit" which meant it was a dead ball. Funnily, the incident repeated itself once again in the same over and Smith was really angry by then which led to an animated discussion between him and Llong for several seconds walking off the ground.
"He's saying 'mate, I'm trying to get out of the way. You can see he's frustrated, Steve Smith," Ricky Ponting said on air. Simon Katich, however, found a more centralised view saying, both Smith and the umpire were partially in the right, with the batsman evading one ball but barely moving before being hit by another.
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