On Day 2 of the fourth Test in Ahmedabad, confusion arose when spinner Nathan Lyon and stand-in captain Steve Smith were left bewildered over a DRS decision that went against Australia. Despite clear evidence showing that Shubman Gill was not out, Smith and Lyon engaged in a lengthy discussion with on-field umpire Richard Kettleborough, seeking clarification.
This occurred during the 18th over of the Indian innings, which had started brightly with openers Gill and Rohit Sharma making good progress. Lyon bowled the ball on the fourth stump line, and there appeared to be a close impact between the bat and pad.
Australia decided to take a review, but the impact was on the pad and outside off-stump, meaning Gill was not out. However, confusion arose when the TV umpire decided to use the ball tracker, which revealed that the ball would have hit the leg-stump, despite being ‘three metres’ off target.
Kettleborough ultimately upheld his decision of not out, but this left Lyon, Smith, and Australia uncertain about what had transpired. As Lyon smiled and discussed the decision with the umpire, Rohit also offered his thoughts from the non-striker’s end.
Kettleborough maintained that the ball was ‘going down’, indicating that he thought the ball would miss the leg stump. The stump mic then captured Smith’s exclamation of ‘WHAT?’ as he too was perplexed by the turn of events. After a short pause to clarify the situation, the match continued.
