Lucknow Super Giants vs Kolkata Knight Riders
26 April 2026
Kartik Tyagi bowled two beamers in the final over of LSG's chase but was allowed to continue — umpires called only one dangerous — sparking IPL fury.
Kolkata Knight Riders vs opponents
26 April 2026
Kolkata Knight Riders opener Angkrish Raghuvanshi was given out "obstructing the field" on 26 April 2026 — the highest-profile use of one of cricket's rarest dismissals in IPL history. Third umpire Rohan Pandit ruled that Raghuvanshi had changed his line while watching the throw, denying the fielding side a clean run-out attempt. The decision turned on the question of intent, and split the cricket world.
Gujarat Titans vs Royal Challengers Bengaluru
30 April 2026
Rajat Patidar was given out caught by Jason Holder in the deep during RCB's match against Gujarat Titans on 30 April 2026, in a third-umpire decision that triggered one of the season's most heated on-field arguments. Replays showed Holder still moving and sliding as he completed the take, and Aakash Chopra publicly described the umpire as "the villain" of the call. Virat Kohli, fielding when the next innings began, walked across to argue with the umpires — a clip that was the most-shared cricket video in India for 24 hours.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru vs Sunrisers Hyderabad
22 March 2026
The first controversy of IPL 2026 arrived in the tournament's opening match. Sunrisers Hyderabad batter Heinrich Klaasen was given out for 31 off 22 balls when Phil Salt held a low catch at the deep boundary off Romario Shepherd's bowling. Third umpire Rohan Pandit, working with the angles available to him during the review, ruled the catch fair on the basis of inconclusive evidence. Minutes later, broadcasters aired a top-angle replay that had not been provided during the review and which appeared to show the boundary cushion moving as Salt completed the take. Klaasen, by then walking off, was filmed in a heated exchange with the fourth umpire near the boundary rope.
Kolkata Knight Riders vs Lucknow Super Giants
9 April 2026
Kolkata Knight Riders opener Finn Allen was given out for 9 in the second over of his side's IPL 2026 chase against Lucknow Super Giants at Eden Gardens, after Digvesh Rathi took a low catch at the deep third boundary. Replays appeared to show Rathi's left foot brushing the rope. The on-field umpire ruled the catch fair without referring it upstairs; the third umpire later confirmed the decision under fan and broadcaster criticism, prompting KKR to issue a public statement that the call "should have gone upstairs" first.
Various / ICC
1 December 2020
The ICC's decision to allow home umpires instead of neutral umpires during COVID-19, initially as a temporary measure, reignited debates about umpiring bias in international cricket.
India vs Various / ICC Governance
24 November 2008
India refused to use the Decision Review System for nearly eight years after its introduction, citing concerns about the technology's reliability, while critics accused the BCCI of blocking progress.
Australia vs India
2008-01-06
Steve Bucknor's string of poor decisions in the infamous 2008 Sydney Test became so comically one-sided that even neutral fans were laughing in disbelief.
Various
2003-02-01
New Zealand umpire Billy Bowden became famous for his flamboyant, theatrical umpiring style including his signature 'crooked finger of doom' dismissal.
Pakistan, England
1987-12-09
Days before the Mike Gatting-Shakoor Rana finger-pointing row, Chris Broad refused to leave the crease for over a minute after being given out caught behind, an incident that helped poison the 1987 Faisalabad Test.
New Zealand vs West Indies
12 February 1980
Michael Holding kicked the stumps out of the ground in frustration after an LBW appeal was turned down against John Parker.
Australia v England
1946-11-29
On the first day of the 1946-47 Ashes, Don Bradman — making his Test return after eight years and visibly out of touch on 28 — chopped a ball from Bill Voce that flew chest-high to Jack Ikin at second slip. England appealed for the catch; umpire George Borwick gave it not out, ruling the ball had bumped from the ground. Bradman did not walk. He went on to make 187, England were beaten by an innings and 332, and Hammond's relationship with the Australian captain never recovered. The wicket-that-never-was framed the entire series.
MCC / global
1935-04-01
Two and a half years after Adelaide, the MCC formally amended the Laws of Cricket to give umpires the power to stop bowling that constituted a 'direct attack' on the batsman. The 1935 amendment was the legal full stop on Bodyline. Fast leg theory, until then merely 'against the spirit of the game,' became something an umpire could call dead and intervene against. Bouncers became a rationed weapon for the next two generations.
Australia v England
1898-01-01
On 1 January 1898 at the MCG, umpire Jim Phillips called Australia's Ernie Jones for throwing — the first bowler ever no-balled for a suspect action in a Test match. Jones, the South Australian fast bowler famous for sending a ball through W.G. Grace's beard the previous summer, had been called once before the Test by Phillips in a tour match. The Melbourne call set off a 'chucking question' that would consume English county cricket through 1900-01 and end Arthur Mold's career.
New South Wales v England
1879-02-08
On 8 February 1879 — strictly outside the 1880s but the curtain-raiser to the decade — about 2,000 Sydney spectators invaded the pitch after Australian batsman Billy Murdoch was given run out by the English-engaged Victorian umpire George Coulthard. Lord Harris, the English captain, was struck with a stick; AN Hornby's shirt was torn off; play was suspended. The riot poisoned Anglo-Australian cricket relations for years and explains why no Test was scheduled in England before September 1880.
Various county and representative sides
1864-06-01
The legalisation of overarm bowling in 1864 created an immediate grey zone: how high could the arm go, and at what point did a fast delivery become an illegal throw? Through the 1860s English cricket struggled with this question as a succession of fast bowlers developed actions that umpires suspected but rarely no-balled, creating a climate of suspicion that would recur in every generation of cricket thereafter.
England XI vs Surrey
1862-08-26
Bowling for an England XI against Surrey at the Oval on 26 August 1862, the Kent left-armer Edgar Willsher was no-balled six times in a row by umpire John Lillywhite for raising his hand above the shoulder. Willsher and the eight other professionals in the team marched off the field in protest, leaving the two amateurs stranded. Lillywhite quietly stood down the next day, and within two years the MCC had legalised overarm bowling.
Various county and representative sides
1855-07-01
Umpiring in the 1850s was a notoriously contentious business. Ex-professionals stood as umpires but were often accused of favouring their county's interests; the laws gave batsmen and bowlers little formal right of appeal; and the growing overarm controversy made no-balling — technically required but socially dangerous — a minefield for the men in white coats. Player disputes with umpires were frequent and sometimes ended matches.
MCC; Umpires
1835-06-15
William Caldecourt, a Lord's ground bowler in the 1810s and 1820s, became through the 1830s the senior figure of the MCC professional staff and the club's most-used standing umpire. Caldecourt's interpretations of the roundarm law — especially the shoulder-height limit after the 1835 revision — effectively set the practical boundary that other umpires followed.
n/a
1835-08-01
The leg-before-wicket law had existed in cricket's code since 1774 — and had been tightened in 1839 to require the ball to pitch in line — but in the 1830s it was rarely applied. Umpires of the era were generally unwilling to give a batsman out leg-before unless the ball had hit the pad in the most blatant manner; lbw dismissals were a small fraction of those given by modern umpires.
MCC vs Kent
1822-07-15
Opening the bowling for Kent against MCC at Lord's on 15 July 1822, the Kent farmer John Willes — pioneer of the new roundarm action — was no-balled by the umpire for raising his hand above the prescribed level. Willes threw the ball down, walked off the ground, mounted his horse and rode out of cricket forever. He was the first man to be no-balled in a first-class match for an illegal bowling action and never played another important fixture.
Kent and various private XIs
1816-07-15
Through the 1810s the Kent gentleman cricketer John Willes of Tonford persisted with a delivery action that broke the laws of cricket: the arm raised level with the elbow, often higher, in defiance of the underarm law. According to Arthur Haygarth, Willes had picked up the action from his sister Christiana, who bowled to him in their garden when he was unwell. Through trial games for Kent and private elevens he forced the issue match by match, was no-balled repeatedly, and laid the foundation for the eventual legalisation of roundarm in 1828 and overarm in 1864.
n/a
1816-05-01
In 1816, with John Willes and a small but growing band of Kent and Sussex bowlers persistently raising their arm above the elbow, the MCC revised Law 10 to spell out that bowling must be 'underhand, with the hand below the elbow' and that any horizontal extension of the arm should be called no-ball. The reform was a deliberate effort to suppress roundarm. It failed. Within twelve years the law had to be rewritten in roundarm's favour.
n/a
1811-05-01
Stung by William Lambert's 1810 single-wicket trick of bowling deliberate wides at Lord Frederick Beauclerk to make him lose his temper, the MCC committee in 1811 added a penalty for wide deliveries. From that season on the wide added a run to the batting side, transforming the wide from a tactical nuisance into a punishable error and laying the legal foundation for one of cricket's longest-running rules.