Yashasvi Jaiswal’s dismissal in the recently concluded fourth Test of the BGT 2024 in Melbourne between Australia and India was the talking point on the final day. Australia won the Test by 184 runs and went into the final Test in Sydney 2-1 up.
Jaiswal, who played a brilliant knock of 84 runs, was out to Pat Cummins's bouncer that Alex Carey caught down the leg side. The on-field decision was not out and Cummins opted for a DRS review.
TV umpire Sharfuddoula Ibne Shahid Saikat saw many different angles of the video and used the snickometer. While real-time Snicko displayed a flat line as the ball passed the bat, repeated replays revealed a significant deflection. Sharfuddoula, the third umpire, changed the verdict in favor of Australia based on what he saw, the deflection. Jaiswal was spotted speaking with the umpires before walking away.
This dismissal has sparked much debate amongst the cricket fraternity, and several former cricketers have shared their views on it.
Legendary India cricketer Sunil Gavaskar slammed third umpire Sharfuddoula and said Jaiswal was not out.
“If you are using technology, then use technology only. Whatever I am seeing, I always say that this is an optical illusion. This is an optical illusion. There is snicko, what does snicko say? Snicko is a straight line. So it is absolutely not out.
According to me, this is not out. If anything could be seen from snicko, then it was different. This is a wrong decision. Absolutely wrong decision. Otherwise, don’t use technology. If you are going to go with optical illusion, then don’t use technology at all. It’s simple. It’s very simple,” Gavaskar said on Star Sports.
Former ICC umpire Simon Taufel, who is pundit for 7 Cricket, stated: “In my view the decision was out. The third umpire did make the correct decision in the end. With the technology protocols, we do have a hierarchy of redundancy and when the umpire sees a clear deflection off the bat there is no need to go any further and use any other form of technology to prove the case.”
“The clear deflection is conclusive evidence. In this particular case what we have seen from the third umpire, is they’ve used a secondary form of technology, which for whatever reason hasn’t shown the same conclusive evidence of audio to back up the clear deflection.
In the end, the third umpire did the right thing and went back to the clear deflection and overturned the umpire field. So, in my view, the correct decision was made. I can see the ball has made contact with the gloves. Joel, you need to change your decision. In my view, that decision was out. The third umpire did make the correct decision in the end,” he added.
Ricky Ponting, former Australia cricketer said: “They make of it what they like. It clearly hit the glove. And I caught it at the time, Jaiswal actually started to walk. As soon as the Aussies went upstairs he started to take a couple of steps away. Snicko hasn’t proven it to be correct, but the umpire picked up the deflection and froze it where the ball was on the end of the glove. As far as I’m concerned, there is no argument whatsoever.”
Former India coach Ravi Shastri on Star Sports Hindi said: “I guess to overrule decision third umpire should be convinced that it’s conclusive evidence that the bat has touched the ball and the trajectory of the ball has passed. There are very few such decisions. The decision against KL Rahul too was a wrong one at Perth.”
Warren Brennan, whose company BBG Sports operates Snicko, has explained why there was no spike when the ball looked to pass Yashasvi Jaiswal's glove.
“That was one of the glance-shots where there isn’t any noise so Snicko shows nothing only ambient noise. I checked with the audio director and he said there was no noise either. Probably only Hot Spot could have resolved that one,” Brennan told Code Sports.
India lost seven wickets in the post-Tea session to lose the Test match. Their hopes of WTC final qualification have also taken a hit with this loss.
