The Ranji Trophy clash between Meghalaya and Manipur was marked by the most bizarre dismissal in Ranji Trophy history, as a batsman was dismissed for hitting the ball twice in an attempt to stop it from hitting the stumps.
The fifth round of Ranji Trophy is currently going on, and a strange incident that happened in the plate group matches has left every cricket fan shocked. Some former cricketers like Ravichandran Ashwin have also taken interest in this matter.
The Plate Groups of the Ranji Trophy consist of second-tier teams that are not part of the elite group in the tournament. Manipur, Sikkim, Meghalaya, Bihar, Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh.
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The bizarre incident occurred during a game between Plate Group teams Manipur and Meghalaya, when Manipur’s batsman Ajay Singh was out in one of the rarest dismissals in cricket. He was given out for hitting the ball twice with his bat.
Ajay Singh defended a ball from Aryan Bora and saw it rolling towards the stumps when he stopped the ball with his bat. He had already hit the ball while defending and this was his second deliberate impact of the ball with his bat.
As reported by ESPNcricinfo, people have mentioned that even though the ball was heading towards the stumps and the batsman had used his bat to deflect it, it was within the laws of the game. However, the batsman or no one from the management ever protested against the umpire’s decision.
An official at the venue said, “He could have given it away, but he decided to stop it with his bat and umpire Dharmesh Bhardwaj immediately gave him out for ‘hitting the ball twice’.” “As soon as Meghalaya appealed, the batsmen left.”
Previous incidents of such strange dismissals in Ranji Trophy
There have been incidents in the past too where cricketers have been dismissed in strange ways. For the Ranji Trophy, the last time this happened was during the 2005–06 season, when Jammu and Kashmir captain Dhruv Mahajan was dropped in a similar manner.
Before this, only three other Ranji cricketers had suffered a similar loss: Andhra’s K. Bawanna (1963–64), Shahid Pervez of Jammu and Kashmir (1986–87), and Anand George of Tamil Nadu (1998–99). This time, the dismissals led to a lower-order collapse and Manipur gave their opponents a huge lead in the innings.
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According to section 34.1.1 of the MCC Law, a The striker ‘hits the ball twice’ if the ball makes contact, during play, with any part of his body or bat, and the striker deliberately strikes it a second time with the bat or any part of the body (other than the non-bat-holding hand) before any fielder touches the ball – except when the second strike is solely to protect his wicket.
Despite the law being completely in the batsman’s favor, there was no opposition from him or his team. In fact, former Indian cricketer Ravichandran Ashwin later criticized the decision and commented that such dismissals only happen in ‘street cricket’ and not according to the actual rules of the game.
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