India captain Virat Kohli and Australia skipper Aaron Finch condemned the “zing” bail controversy after David Warner became the fifth batsman to win a reprieve in the ongoing World Cup.
Warner was on one when the bails failed to dislodge when he inside-edged a delivery angled across him from Indian speedster Jasprit Bumrah.
Although India won the match by 36 runs, Warner’s escape could have been a turning point and Kohli made it clear the situation was unacceptable.
“Definitely. This is not something you expect at international level,” he told reporters after the end of the match. “The technology is great. It’s very precise when you make something happen with the stumps.
“But you literally have to smash the stumps really hard to knock them out. That’s me as a batsman saying that.
“These are fast bowlers, these are not medium-pace bowlers.
“We checked and the stump was not knocked in very hard so I don’t know what’s going on. Is the stump too thick or too rigid?
“No team will like to see that, if you bowl a good ball and you don’t get a guy out. I haven’t seen that happen so many times in the past.”
Finch, who had said pre-match that teams would have to take the good with the bad when it came to the bails, was stronger in his response after the Warner incident.
“We were on the right end of it today but I think going forward, you want – it’s a bit unfair at times, isn’t it? And I know David was … it hit the stumps pretty hard,” he said.
“But it does seem to be happening more and more, which is unfortunate, because you’d hate to see something like that happen in a World Cup final or a semi-final or something like that, that you’ve done the hard work as a bowler or a fielding side to set a player up or get the mistake and it not be rewarded.
“I’m not sure what you can do. I don’t know how much lighter they can make the bails.”
When the ball hits the wicket, bails are failing to come off when hit
In the West Indies’ game against Australia on Thursday (June 6), Chris Gayle was saved when the bails stayed on despite his stump being clipped by a 91 mph (146 kph) Mitchell Starc delivery.
Other high-profile instances included South Africa’s Quinton de Kock being reprieved against England in the tournament’s opening game and Sri Lanka’s Dimuth Karunaratne surviving against New Zealand.
