VIDEO | Keemo Paul “obstructs” Deepak Hooda to court controversy in IPL eliminator

05/08/2019

Keemo Paul and the last over controversy are a bond attached to one another. The bowler, who used Mankading to help Windies U-19 win against Zimbabwe U-19 in the U-19 World Cup in 2016, obstructed Deepak Hooda while he was running for his single and by then, Rishabh Pant had run the batsman out.

Anyone who has followed Keemo Paul since his U-19 days knows that he was a part of a controversy in the side’s narrow two-run victory over Zimbabwe in the 2016 U19 World Cup. Zimbabwe needed three runs to win with just one wicket remaining when Paul began the final over of what was a thrilling match in Chittagong. Although the incident that happened in Vizag was no way similar to the incident three years ago, it is not difficult to draw a parallel.

On the penultimate delivery of the 20th over in the SRH’s innings, Paul bowled a slower ball wide outside off stump as Hooda swung and missed the delivery altogether. Umpire S Ravi instantly called that as a wide, and Rashid Khan, standing at the other end, called for a bye. Hooda instantly responded to that and started running, but Rishabh Pant was alert at the other end to throw the ball.

Then Keemo Paul, who was standing at the other end, had his eyes fixed on the ball and didn’t know that Hooda was running on exact some path. To stop Rishabh Pant’s ball - god knows why he did that despite knowing fully that the ball had been directed at the non-striker stumps - Paul put in a dive which almost looked like a rugby tackle on Hooda.

The ball went on to hit the stumps directly, but that made both the umpires S Ravi and Bruce Oxenford doubt the bowler’s act. Even Shreyas Iyer was unsure if Hooda should’ve been given out, but Rishabh Pant came forward to explain that their team didn’t do anything wrong and Hooda should’ve been called out.

The umpire eventually called him out, but that raised a lot of questions was Paul’s act fair?