TNPL 2023: R. Ashwin reviews an already overturned decision during Match 4

The fourth match in the Tamil Nadu Premier League 2023 between Dindigul Dragons and Ba11sy Trichy saw the rarest of rare incidents on the cricket pitch as both the batter and the bowler referred the decision on the same delivery. The incident occurred during the first innings. On the fifth delivery of the 13^th over bowled by Dragons’ Ravichandran Ashwin, Trichy’s R Rajkumar was given out by the on-field umpire as the players appealed for caught behind.

Unhappy with the decision, the batter immediately reviewed the decision. The replays found that Rajkumar’s bat had hit the ground at the same time when the ball was close to his bat. The Ultra-edge showed a spike, however, the third-umpire found a clear gap between the bat and the ball and hence, overturned the decision to be ‘not out’.

However, as soon as the on-field umpire changed his decision and signalled not out, Ashwin went for the review again. The third umpire once again went through the entire process and found no edge and hence the decision stood not out.

2 reviews in one ball, one by batter and one by bowler (Ashwin).

Rarest of incident in world cricket. pic.twitter.com/jB1zZ9qcmw

— Johns. (@CricCrazyJohns) June 14, 2023

Coming back to the match, Trichy Captain Ganga Sridhar Raju won the toss and elected to bat first. They didn’t get off to the best of the starts as opener Jafar Jamal (4) was dismissed in the first over itself by Saravana Kumar. The dismissal started a flurry of wickets for Trichy as they found themselves reeling at 49/6 after 10.2 overs.

Captain Raju (48 off 41) and R Rajkumar (39 off 22) added 65 runs for the seventh wicket off just 40 balls to help their side cross the 100-run mark. However, after their partnership ended as Ashwin dismissed Raju in the 17th over, Trichy couldn’t find support from the tailenders.

As a result, they got bundled out for 120 in 19.1 overs with Sarvana Kumar (2/17, 3 overs), Ashwin (2/26), and Subodh Bhati (2/8, 3.1 overs) picking up two wickets each for the Dragons. In reply, Dragons also got an early blow as they lost their opener Vimal Khumar for a two-ball duck in the very first over. However, his opening partner Shivam Singh played a brilliant knock (46 off 30) to keep his side afloat in the chase. Dragons ultimately won the contest by six wickets.