Marais Erasmus, who called time on his international umpiring career earlier this year, has admitted that he alongside Kumar Dharmasena made a “massive error” during the infamous 2019 World Cup final between England and New Zealand at Lord’s, referring to the controversial six overthrow runs.
With England needing 9 runs from the last three balls, 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 running between the wickets even though Stokes and Adil Rashid didn’t cross as they went for a second run.
“The next morning I opened my hotel room door on my way to breakfast and Kumar opened his door at the same time and he said, ‘did you see we made a massive error?’” Erasmus told The Telegraph.
“That’s when I got to know about it. But in the moment on the field, we just said six, you know, communicated to each other, ‘six, six, it’s six’ not realising that they haven’t crossed, it wasn’t picked up. That’s it.”
Given the fact that the batters 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, batters should have swapped sides for the next delivery as they didn’t cross at the time of the throw. That would have meant that leg-spinner Rashid and not Stokes should have faced the penultimate delivery.
Law 19.8 of the MCC rulebook states: “If the boundary results from an overthrow or from the wilful act of a fielder, the runs scored shall be any runs for penalties awarded to either side and the allowance for the boundary and the runs completed by the batsmen, together with the run in progress if they had already crossed at the instant of the throw or act.”
The umpiring error helped England take the match into Super Over and they eventually lifted the coveted trophy on the basis of a boundary count.
