Former England captain Michael Vaughan was not happy with the way things unfolded in the third and final ODI between India and England Women at the Lord’s on Saturday. India won the match by 16 runs and clean-swept the series 0-3.
England were 65/7 at one stage, but then Charlie Dean (47) and some rearguard action from lower-order batters took them very close to the target. But in the 44th over, Deepti Sharma ran out Dean at the non-striker’s end ending her valiant effort and earning the win for India.
Dean was caught by Deepti venturing a bit too far from the return crease and whipped off the bails and appealed. The third umpire was consulted and confirmed that Dean was out of her ground and gave her out, leading to the batter breaking down in tears.
This led to a meltdown on social media as multiple former and current England cricketers slammed the mode of dismissal used and despite it being legal in the rule book, accused Deepti of hurting the spirit of cricket by running out Dean.
Michael Vaughan joined Stuart Broad, Nasser Hussain, James Anderson, and Sam Billings among others in criticizing Deepti.
He posted on Instagram: “No way to ever win a cricket match”
He also took to Twitter and posted a message saying: “Mankad is in the rules, but I hope it’s not a go too tactic .. You surely don’t train all your lives to win a game using that tactic .. and I know Batters should train to stay behind the line but it stinks seeing a game won like that .. Yesterday was a bloody good game too #India.”
However, this holier-than-thou message from Vaughan didn’t sit well with the Indian cricket fans who admonished him on Twitter.
Here are the tweets:
