Chaos broke out in the Caribbean Premier League on Thursday evening. Kieron Pollard expressed his displeasure at the controversial annulment of the third referee’s decision against Imad Wasim.

Pollard’s Trinbago Knight Riders (TKR) were put in to bat by the Antigua & Barbuda Falcons (ABF) and scored 134-8. Pollard himself was the star batting player, scoring the highest number of points with 47.

In the chase, the Falcons lost Brandon King and Kofi James in the powerplay before Hassan Khan was stumped on the first ball of the tenth over, leaving his team 68-3 behind. Then Imad Wasim came to bat and the first ball he faced caused controversy.

On-field call reversed

The left-hander received a blow to the front pad from Sunil Narine from around the wicket. TKR’s fielders appealed for LBW, but umpire Christopher Taylor remained unmoved. After a brief discussion, captain Pollard signalled that the call should be passed on to TV umpire Nigel Duguid.

During the review, the umpire checked whether the ball had struck the bat and, despite an obvious significant deflection from the bat face, ruled that it had not. The ball tracking visuals showed that the ball would have struck the stumps and Imad was adjudged to be out as the umpire’s decision was overturned on the field.

The batsman was shocked by the decision and protested to the on-field umpires. While he was making his point, a few more replays appeared on the big screen in the stadium and Imad pointed to them to show that there was clear evidence that he had hit the ball. But after being ruled out, he eventually left the field and went back to the dressing room.

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Reversal of on-field call reversed

But then, in a strange turn of events, field referee Taylor received an instruction (presumably from the TV referee) to reverse the already overturned decision to leave the field and recall Imad from the field.

This time it was TKR’s turn to protest the decision. Play had already been suspended for almost five minutes because the new batsman had still not come to the batting crease.

Pollard was involved in a lively discussion with the umpires, with television commentators speculating that he was trying to make it clear that Imad had left the field after being sent off and could not be recalled. Coach Phil Simmons said the same thing to the fourth umpire.

After much deliberation and discussion, Imad was finally allowed to come out and continue his innings.

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This incident may have exposed a grey area in the Laws of the Game, as there is no explicit provision for such an incident. Law 31.7 allows the umpires to recall a striker who left the wicket in the false belief that it was an outbut in this case, Imad had only left after he came out.

Even if the correct decision may have ultimately been made, Pollard and TKR’s position may be strengthened by the fact that the overturning of the TV referee’s original decision was not done according to due process but was simply spontaneous.

After a break, Imad Wasim pulls off a “Ben Stokes” and scores a deflected four

But the controversy did not end there. Imad batted through the innings to help ABF move closer to their target. In the 19th over, when 15 runs were required from 10 balls, Imad hit the ball to long-on, attempting to score two runs.

As he approached the batting crease after the second run, the deep throw hit Imad on the hand, bounced off him and bounced to the boundary in a manner reminiscent of Ben Stokes during the 2019 World Cup final. Pollard was not happy with this incident either and clapped sarcastically in Imad’s direction. TKR also used a review to see if Imad could be ejected from the game for obstructing the field, but the decision was not made.

2019 final, today the same at cpl
Today’s game had everything pic.twitter.com/IAORyYuc6R

— FAKHAR 💚 AMIR 💜IMAD (@hahs4221522) 20 September 2024

ABF scored a total of six runs thanks to the deflection and three throws later, Imad took his side over the finish line, finishing the game unbeaten with 36 runs from 27 balls. He was not the player of the match though, as that award perhaps oddly went to ABF’s opening batsman Justin Greaves. He scored 46 runs from 48 balls and was taken out by his team at the end of the 18th over so they could field a better batsman in the middle.

When asked about Imad’s dismissal at the post-match presentation, Pollard channelled his inner Jose Mourinho and simply said: “If I speak, I get in trouble”, while victorious captain Chris Green called it “chaos, absolute chaos”.

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