The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Saturday (July 27) came out in defence of the under-fire umpires Kumar Dharmasena and Marais Erasmus for their controversial six overthrow runs during the ICC World Cup 2019 final between England and New Zealand at Lord’s on July 14.

With England needing 9 runs from the last three balls, New Zealand opener Martin Guptill threw the ball from deep square leg which accidentally hit the outstretched bat of a diving Ben Stokes and went to the boundary. In total, the hosts were awarded six runs – four for the resulting boundary and two for the batsmen’s running between the wickets.

Following the match, some experts including former umpire Simon Taufel had opined that Dharmasena made ‘an error of judgment’ in applying an unclear clause in the MCC’s laws and England should have been awarded five runs instead of six.

Two weeks after the heart-stopping finale, ICC spoke about the contentious decision and stood by both the umpires.

“They had to make a judgement call on the day as to whether the batsmen had crossed when the throw was released,” ICC’s general manager of cricket, Geoff Allardice, was quoted as saying by ESPNCricinfo.

“After everything that went on during that delivery, they got together over their comms system and made their decision. They certainly followed the right process when making the decision.

“They were aware of the law when they made the judgment about whether the batsmen had crossed or not at the time. The playing conditions don’t allow them to refer to such a decision to a third umpire. The match referee cannot intervene when the umpires on the field have to make a judgement call like that,” he added.

Provided the fact that batsmen had not crossed for their second run at the instant Guptill threw the ball, the second run should not have been counted. If the umpires had applied the clause properly, England would have needed four runs from the last two balls instead of three.

Moreover, batsmen should have swapped sides for the next delivery as they didn’t cross at the time of the throw. That would have meant that spinner Adil Rashid and not Stokes should have faced the penultimate delivery.

Meanwhile, Kumar Dharmasena had admitted that there had been a judgemental error in awarding six runs from the overthrow but also added that he will “never regret the decision”.