Sri Lanka Cricket Tries To Clear T20I Toss Controversy
With the toss controversy marring the recently-concluded one-off T20I between Sri Lanka and India, Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC), on Friday (September 8), posted another video of the toss to clarify things.
The match saw the uneven contest between the two teams continued as the Men in Blue thrashed the Islanders by 7 wickets to complete a historic ‘tour wash’. However, a video that surfaced after the game soured the victory to some extent after it suggested a wrongdoing during the toss.
With both the captains- Virat Kohli and Upul Tharanga standing at the crease along with match-referee Andy Pycroft, ready for the toss, the Sri Lankan captain flipped the coin and Kohli called heads. Pycroft went to check the result of the toss and pointed his hand towards the captain. But with so much noise around, Pycroft’s verdict could not be heard clearly on the video clip. Everything seemed fine as toss presenter Murali Kartik invited Kohli first as the referee had perhaps said that India had won the toss. However, Pycroft’s gesture when Kartik called Kohli raised a lot of eyebrows. As soon as Kohli walked towards Kartik, Pycroft spread his arms in surprise.
Here is the video that caused the controversy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=UIk5XE31_aw
However, with so much hue and cry surrounding the toss, SLC came out with a video in an attempt to put the controversy to the bed. However, the latest video is also not very not clear as far as the audio is concerned and surprisingly they have have not included the part where Pycroft expressed his surprise.
The cricket board’s official Twitter handle posted the snippet of the toss with the caption: #SLvInd T20I: Match Referee Andy PYCROFT called it correctly – “Heads India”.
#SLvInd T20I: Match Referee Andy PYCROFT called it correctly – "Heads India". Watch the video pic.twitter.com/tsYTHv8UCC
— Sri Lanka Cricket ?? (@OfficialSLC) September 8, 2017
India had decided to bowl the first in the final match of the tour and had restricted Sri Lanka to 170 for 7 in the allotted 20 overs. In reply, India were in a spot of bother after being reduced to 42 for two, but Kohli and Manish Pandey scored half-centuries to take the them home.
