Star Bangladesh player complains about umpiring quality in South Africa

Bangladesh is on a tour to South Africa. The two teams are battling it out in a Two-match test series after they faced off in a limited-overs series.

The first test of the series is taking place at Kingsmead, Durban. After Bangladesh put South Africa to bat, the hosts put on a total of 367 runs in the first innings. Bangladesh replied strongly scoring 298 runs in their first innings. South Africa came out to bat with a lead of 69 runs and score 204 runs in their second innings. Bangladesh was left to chase 273 runs in the fourth innings. At the end of the 4^th day, Bangladesh’s chances seem dim as they are 3 down for 11 runs.

During the third innings of the match, a few decisions went against Bangladesh. The incident did not go down well with the star Bangladeshi all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan, as he took to Twitter commenting on the quality of umpiring in the test. The umpires for the match are Adrian Holdstock and Marais Erasmus.

Bangladesh made several LBW appeals during South Africa’s second innings which were turned down by the umpires. One noticeable event occurred during the 26^th over, when Khaled Ahmed was denied an LBW decision against Keegan Petersen, the visitors did not take a DRS, but replays showed that the bowl would have hit the stumps. A few other such decisions led to discontent among the visitors.

Shakib tweeted stating that it’s time for the international cricket authority to go back to neutral umpires. Worthy of mention is the fact that due to COVID 19 pandemic home umpires were being used for matches. Shakib was supported by Bangladesh team director Khaled Mahmud. He called the umpiring ‘inconsistent’ and sad that they would have been chasing 180 runs rather than 270 if the decisions had gone their way.