VIDEO | Third umpire declares Ben Dunk “Out” despite fielder admitting the "drop"

SportsCafe Desk

BySportsCafe Desk, SportsCafe Editor

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The soft-signal rule has done more harm than good in the cricketing world and the ongoing edition of the BBL has been hugely affected by it. Yesterday, Ben Dunk had to rue his luck after the on-field umpire gave the soft-signal as “Out” despite the fielder admitting that he had dropped the catch.

The cricketing cognoscenti have often sided with the fielder’s opinion for catches in the deep, but with the advent of technology, that has now been largely irrelevant. However, it is very rare to see an umpire giving Out as the soft signal when the fielder himself is saying that he had dropped it and it is even more extraordinary to see the third umpire staying with the umpire’s decision despite knowing that the fielder had already signaled about the drop catch.

The incident in question took place in the second over of Melbourne Stars’ innings against Perth Scorchers, when Dunk pulled a Nathan Coulter-Nile delivery which went too high and it seemed like it landed in front of the square-leg fielder Nick Hobson. While the crowd went up instantly, Hobson too signaled that he felt the ball didn't carry and Coulter-Nile also agreed to the same without reacting before walking straight back to his bowling mark.

However, Perth Scorchers’ wicket-keeper Cameron Bancroft had a completely different view on that and asked the umpires if they could go upstairs to check the catch. Umpires Nathan Johnstone and Gerard Abood did a mini-meeting before agreeing to go refer the third umpire, but to everyone’s surprise, Johnstone gave the soft signal as “out”. That surprised everyone and as the TV replay found out to be inconclusive, the third umpire couldn’t really change the on-field decision to leave Dunk hugely surprised and disappointed.

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