Run outs are very common in limited-over cricket as the batsmen are always looking for quick runs even from the close in positions, but what happened with Andre Russell in yesterday’s Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) game was probably the most unique run out of all time.
It was the second game of the ongoing edition of the BPL and one of the game’s biggest superstars, Andre Russell, was batting for Minister Group Dhaka against Khulna Tigers. The game was evenly poised and everyone around was waiting for some big hits off the bat of the West Indies allrounder, but he got himself run out in a strange way.
Russell tried to steer a delivery through the gap between backward point and short third man, but got the shot finer than he anticipated and the ball was fielded by the short third man fielder who threw it to the striker’s end, however the batsman running towards striker’s end reached his crease well in time before the ball hit the stumps.
Andre Russell was running towards the nonstriker end and he knew that he was not going towards the danger end because the throw was going to be at the striker’s end. He was just jogging through and he was more worried about the other batsman who was running to the danger end.
However, what happened was that the ball hit the stumps at the striker’s end and it then ricocheted towards the non-striker end and before Russell could realize that the ricocheted ball was coming towards the stumps at the non-striker end, the ball had already hit the stumps at the non-striker end and Russell was well short of his ground.
Dismissal of Andre Russell was completely legal technically
Neither Russell, nor the other players on the field at that point of time could believe what actually happened, but technically it was a completely legal dismissal and the third umpire, after having a look at the footage, decided to give Russell out, much to the disappointment of fans who were waiting for a whirlwind knock from the Caribbean dasher.
The former Indian player Wasim Jaffer reacted to the video of the incident on Twitter, saying that he has been watching and playing cricket for quite a long time and never at any point has he seen a batsman dismissed like that at any level of cricket.
I've been playing cricket and watching cricket all my life. Never have I seen something like this. Just unbelievable 🤯 🎥: @FanCode https://t.co/2CUACSJDL0
— Wasim Jaffer (@WasimJaffer14) January 22, 2022
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Russell’s team, Minister Group Dhaka, although, put a score of more than 180 on the board even after Russell’s dismissal, but they ended up losing the game.