Former Australian leg spinner Shane Warne has called the Pakistan umpire Aleem Dar a “bad umpire” claiming that Aleem got plenty of decisions wrong in the past. Warne was reacting to a video of an Ashes test of 2013 in England, where Stuart Broad nicked one off Ashton Agar straight to first slip and did not walk.
However, what was more shocking than Stuart Broad not walking was that even the umpire Aleem Dar did not give him out. The then Australian captain Michael Clarke, who was himself at the first slip position and took the catch, just could not believe the reaction of both the batsmen and the umpire. It was such a thick outside edge that even technology was not needed to determine it.
Two former England players, Andrew Strauss and David Lloyd, were on the air at that point in time, and even they could not believe the audacity of the batsmen to not walk back to the pavilion and rather walk down the pitch and have a chat with his batting partner.
The commentators, however, tried to explain the situation from the umpire’s perspective, saying that the outside edge first hit the wicketkeeper’s gloves and ricocheted from there to the first slip, and it was that which perhaps confused the umpire.
Aleem Dar has given some shocking decisions in his career
Shane Warne, though, had no kind words for Aleem Dar at all, as he recalled that Ashes game, quoting a video on Twitter earlier today. According to Warne, for Stuart Broad to not walk was still understandable and was even admirable to some extent from England’s perspective, but for Aleem Dar to not give it out was shocking and it just reflected on his ability as an umpire.
You have to admire @StuartBroad8 for not walking here. Showed serious Kahunas hahaha. Also shows you how bad an umpire Aleem Dar was and how many decisions he got wrong !!!!!!! 😩 https://t.co/s2ZE6XWNtU
Advertisement— Shane Warne (@ShaneWarne) December 19, 2021
It was not the first time that Aleem Dar failed to spot a clear outside edge to the first slip. In one of the ODI games between India and South Africa more than a decade ago, Aleem had refused to give AB de Villiers out when he had nicked Zaheer Khan straight to Sachin Tendulkar in the first slip.
It was not even a thin edge to the wicketkeeper, it was a huge deflection to first slip, but Aleem just turned down the appeal straightaway and the Indian fielders were shocked. The DRS was not available at that time, so the decision couldn’t be overturned, as De Villiers survived and batted further in the game.
