Is this out ?

[khawi]

Liv in Pak so no Utube for me

 

[Engle]

Am I missing something ?
He's diving for the ball, so the question of control of his body is not relevant.
The question is did he prevent the ball from touching the ground.
If you slo-mo the tape or stop it, you see that his hand is over the ball. Which means that the ball hit the ground and he stopped it from going further.

It's great fielding and should be applauded.

But it's not a catch.

 

[Migara]

Looks suspicious

 

[jeevan]

By the precise letter of the law, no. By common sense and precedents that have been set over 100 years of cricket from park to international, yes.

Haha. For most of those 100 years and most of those occasions, there has been an absence of appropriate technology and atleast an appearance of sportsmanship.

With the action caught on a good angle on camera, and the player being Andrew Symonds - neither circumstance applies. Stick to the letter.

 

[Dick Rockett]

Hmm. Having looked at the footage in more detail, I believe that he actually dropped it. From what I can see, the ball's gone into the palm of his hand and he's forced it back out again and straight into the ground.

 

[Sanz]

Not out I reckon.

I think this one is different to the Ponting one in the Sydney test, where he's controlled it and then the ball has touched the ground.

Here I don't think you can say he had complete control when the ball hit the ground. The ball hitting the ground allowed him to have control.

Has been more than workable for many years. Now that video footage is putting things under the microscope more I think the rules should be modified to reflect this.

But yeah, agree with Jono, this case is slightly different from the Ponting one because here it looks like he may not have even had control of it before touching the ground at all.

But that's again an assumption that Ponting had the control of the ball and Symonds didn't. I for one think that both of them had complete control of the ball but technically both were not outs. Only Ponting and Symonds knew for sure whether or not they had the complete control of the ball. Someone else might assume otherwise and hence the inconsistency in the decisions. And I think same thing happened, Ponting's catch was ruled not out and Symonds' was ruled out.

In order to get the consistency, I guess either we follow the current law to the T or ammend the law to allow the ball to touch the ground after the catch is taken (although that IMO will open a whole new pandora's box of issues)

 

[Perm]

In order to get the consistency, I guess either we follow the current law to the T or ammend the law to allow the ball to touch the ground after the catch is taken (although that IMO will open a whole new pandora's box of issues)

Exactly. Either you police the law, or amend it. Having to apply an opinion to something like this issue is fairly dangerous.

 

[pasag]

Ponting's catch wasn't ruled anything because it was a no ball or wasn't any bat involved (can't remember).

The thing that seperates the Symonds one though, watching it again and again is that it doesn't look like he had control of it before hitting the ground. It's hard to say though, need better footage.

 

[silentstriker]

Yes, much easier and less subjective to simply decide whether the ball hit the ground, rather than whether he had 'control'. It hit the ground, and so it was out.

 

[Top_Cat]

Yes, much easier and less subjective to simply decide whether the ball hit the ground, rather than whether he had 'control'. It hit the ground, and so it was out.

What's the 'ground'? Is it the grass or a firm enough push into the ground so that he could feel the ground underneath the grass? If his finger separates and one blade of grass touches the ball, is it 'grassed'? Would you expect anyone to hand themselves up in that manner?

Personally, I don't really give a crap because I reckon the law needs adjustment but these are the sorts of questions which could be asked in a disciplinary hearing where a fielder has, for example, claimed a catch which 'looked' bad and was cited for unfair play.

Speaking of how stupid the law is, how about Gambhir's attempt on the fence yesterday? Took a screamer on the rope yet because his momentum was taking him over the line, had to throw it away. He had perfect control of the ball and it was a great take yet because he had to move a metre over the line, it would have been 6? That, to my mind, is no way to reward what was a great catch. As I've said, Aussie Rules football has it right here (for once); if you take a ball in the field of play, it should be out even if your momentum takes you over the line. Of course, it's easier to police this in Aussie Rules but with video footage, it should be possible to determine a fair catch with this type of rule.

 

[R_D]

No suprise channel 9, didn't show any close up replay of this catch that day. I didn't think it was a clean catch at the time and this video only confirms it that the ball touched the ground. Not a catch for me.

 

[shortpitched713]

Yes, much easier and less subjective to simply decide whether the ball hit the ground, rather than whether he had 'control'. It hit the ground, and so it was out.

Personally I think that it should come down to an umpire's interpretation of a replay simply being accepted as the benchmark for whether or not control was maintained. Catches shouldn't be nullified simply because the ball happened to brush the ground on your way up, and 99% of video replays you can tell with fair degree of accuracy if control was maintained.

 

[Ikki]

I think the laws are being mis-read on this one. The relevant law;

A catch shall be considered to have been fairly made if

(c) the ball does not touch the ground, even though the hand holding it does so in effecting the catch.

It's not saying that the hand holding the ball can't touch the ground whilst the ball is in hand otherwise every slips catch where the catcher takes the ball two-handed but is touching the ground as it lands in the hand would be not-out too and there are plenty of those. The law allows, for example, for one to take the catch diving and sliding arm-first along the ground. No, I would reckon that if there is finger/hand between the ball and ground when the ball is taken it's a fair catch and from what I saw, Symond's fingers (third and 4th) were under the ball when the catch was taken. I'm sure the ball touched a few blades of grass between his fingers but is that 'grounded'? Don't think so, myself. Fair catch for mine.

Put it this way, if you give that not, there are so many slips, gully and cover catches destined to go the same way so as to make a game farcical.

Unless you have a telescope able to zoom right in, you won't see whether those blades of grass touched the ball. I get the scene in Futurama in my head where the outcome of a horse race is decided by electron microscope and Farnsworth complains "No fair! You changed the outcome by looking at it!" It seems like it's just going to get that ridiculous and even then you won't satisfy everyone.

Yeah, agree, great post.

It is still touching the ground! So not out.

Its funny how nearly everyone who has posted in this thread has said not out, yet the poll is in favour of "Yes". Where are you cowards? No reason? No explanation?

It doesn't matter if it touches the ground. If he has control of it and it touches the ground it is fine. Under the rules you can have control of it in mid-air, so there is no relevance to whether it touched the ground if you think he had control of it.

IMO, he stopped the ball in it's trajectory in his hand and the way he dived forced his hand onto the ground. It didn't aid him and control was established just before, so a fair catch.

As I've said before, catches like these have been given a lot. It's a matter of interpretation of control; if the umpires think said player had control before it touched the ground, they'll give it. So to see so many of these catches given throughout the years I am surprised why some of them have been questioned.

 

[silentstriker]

It doesn't matter if it touches the ground. If he has control of it and it touches the ground it is fine. Under the rules you can have control of it in mid-air, so there is no relevance to whether it touched the ground if you think he had control of it.

Wrong:

The fielder has to be in complete control of the ball and his action before the catch is considered 'complete'. So if a fielder is rolling on the ground and any part of the ball touches the ground, the batsman is not out. He must complete his movement and emerge with the ball firmly in his hand without the ball having touched the ground for the batsman to be out.

He has to complete his movement. Mid air is still not completing the movement. You are not in complete control of your body until you are done diving.


Law 32:
The act of making the catch shall start from the time when a fielder first handles the ball and shall end when a fielder obtains complete control both over the ball and over his own movement.