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World Cup Final Umpire Admits Decision Error


It's been almost a whole month since World Cup 2019 ended but people had still not given up on the erroneous decision made by Umpire Kumar Dharmasena. The decision which lead the defeat of New Zealand and win of England. It was indeed not the kind of error which should be forgiven and forgotten. Hence, critics and experts kept digging in the matter. Even Simon Taufel declared clear error made by the umpire and he supported his comment with the rules. He also added that the team England should have been given five runs instead of six.


This became the most controversial stories of World Cup ever. Since, it was a very close contested match and both teams gave their 100% but one won just because of the misjudgment of an umpire. The error was actually made in giving one extra run to team England in the overthrow boundary. It was the last over of the final match of the World Cup which ended up in a tie. So if that single run was not granted so generously to England, New Zealand could have been the winner this season.


The gravity of that decision of giving six runs to England is the reason people were not willing to let go of this matter.


Anyhow after further investigation the umpire who gave six runs on the overthrow admitted that he made an error and gave one extra run to England.


During the overthrow the ball thrown by Michael Guptil hit Ben Stokes while he was attempting to complete his second run. After which it deflected towards the boundary to which the Sri Lankan umpire gave six runs to the team.


When the match was tied after three more balls a super over was played in which England batted first and New Zealand while chasing the score given by England tied the match again. However, team England was declared as the winner of the tournament since they scored more boundaries than New Zealand.


The Sri Lankan umpire explained that he did not take advantage of television replay due to which he failed to notice that the batsmen had not crossed each other before the throw was made. Agreeing to the fact that he did make a mistake in giving one extra run now that he sees it in the television replays he said that he does not regret the decision he made. Because he communicated with the leg umpire which was heard by the match referee and other umpires too.


While they did not have the privilege of seeing a television review, all of them confirmed that the batsman had completed the second run. This is what he based his decision on and finally decided to signal for six runs.


"It's easy for people to comment after seeing TV replays," said Dharmasena.

The Australians also defended the umpires, saying that they had to take complicated decision hence it would be unfair to say that their mistake had altered the result of the match.


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