Was it right on India’s part to run Charlie Dean out at non-striker’s end?
India Women created history on September 21, clinching a famous ODI series victory on English soil and with a game to spare. Three days later, India scripted yet another chapter in the history books of Indian women’s cricket, completing a 3-0 whitewash over a strong England side. However, at the end of the proceedings, there was only one thing that snatched all the focus and attention – the Charlie Dean runout.
At one point, it seemed as though Dean, who was single-handedly pulling all the strings for England, would take them over the finishing line and avoid the hosts from the humiliation of a whitewash. And that is when India’s star allrounder Deepti Sharma caught Dean off-guard, running her out at the non-striker’s end for backing up too far. And as has always been the case with this mode of runout, she soon found herself at the receiving end of severe backlash with a number of players such James Anderson, Stuart Broad, Sam Billings and Nasser Hussain among others, criticising Sharma and India for the runout.
Why running out a non-striker for backing up too far is always frowned upon by a significant portion of players and fans alike? It is for one simple reason – for lacking sportsmanship or for not abiding by the “spirit” of the law. Whether it is actually unsportsmanlike or not, let us come to that later. But the other instances, which are regarded as unsporting, such as a batter not walking after a caught behind or a fielding captain not withdrawing the appeal in case a batter has been wrongly given out, receive little to no backlash.
In the case of running a non-striker out, the only reason why it receives much more attention than the above-mentioned instances is because of the rarity of its occurrence. Star bowler Broad himself inferred it, claiming that 99 per cent of the players he has played with do not walk after nicking the ball, contrary to only one per cent attempting a non-striker runout. It is almost as if to suggest ‘it is ok to attempt the runout if there are enough people doing it’.
Talking specifically about the Dean’s runout, prior to the penultimate incident, she had backed up early a whopping 72 times, as pointed out by journalist Peter Della Penna in an eye-opening Twitter thread. The very reason the law enables a bowler to use this mode of runout is to not let non-strikers take unfair advantage by running fewer yards than what a legal run mandates.
And the fact that Dean took a head start 72 times, resulting in a considerable amount of runs, simply defeats fair play. Also, with so much emphasis given on the runout, especially since Ravichandran Ashwin infamously ran Jos Buttler out in the IPL, non-strikers must simply stay in the crease until the bowlers release the ball. It is not wrong to take a headstart as a non-striker, but they should accept the risk of being run out just like how a batter gambles against being stumped at the other end.
