Moments after the a Martin Guptill throw had ricocheted off his bat and flew to the boundary for an additional four runs, England all-rounder Ben Stokes asked the umpires a question that could have cost England the ICC World Cup.
Speaking on the BBC’s Tailenders podcast, Test teammate James Anderson revealed that Stokes had actually asked the umpires to overturn the boundary from the overthrow, meaning four less runs for England.
“The etiquette in cricket is if the ball is thrown at the stumps and it hits you and goes into a gap in the field you don’t run,” Anderson said.
“But if it goes to the boundary, in the rules it’s four and you can’t do anything about it.
“I think, talking to Michael Vaughan who saw him after the game, Ben Stokes actually went to the umpires and said, ‘Can you take that four runs off. We don’t want it’.
“But it’s in the rules and that’s the way it is. It’s been talked about for a while among the players, potentially that being a dead ball if it does hit the batsman and veer off somewhere,” the England paceman said.
“It was truly an incredible question to ask of the umpires, considering the gravity of the situation and the fact it would have left England struggling to force a tie after 50 overs of batting,” he added.
Stokes was visibly concerned with the bonus runs, which has since gone on to open up a can of worms, at such a crucial moment in the World Cup final, he threw his hands up to apologise for the incident, before telling reporters just how sorry he was.
“Playing against New Zealand is always a good event, they are good lads. I will be apologising to Kane (Williamson) for the rest of my life… It was written in the stars to happen for us,” he said.
A day after the final, former ICC Umpire of the Year Simon Taufel spoke about the incident and said England should have been awarded five runs and not six because the umpires had made a clear error in interpreting the laws.
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