DRS controversy in WPL 2024: Chamari Athapaththu’s dismissal leaves UP Warriorz shocked

Mar. 5 (IND) - The last match of the Bengaluru leg in the onging Women's Premier League between RCB Women and UP Warriorz sparked controversy. Chamari Athapaththu's LBW dismissal was in question and the ball which seemed to be missing the stumps shockingly hit the stumps much to surprise of everyone.

The second edition of the Women's Premier League (WPL) has created a lot of buzz with matches being played in Bengaluru and Delhi this year. The Bengaluru leg concluded on Monday (March 4) with the match between Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) and UP Warriorz (UP) even as a massive controversy sparked during the chase with Chamari Athpaththu given out via DRS.

The incident happened in the seventh over of the innings when UP Warriorz were well placed in the chase. Athapaththu missed a sweep shot off Georgia Wareham only for the ball to hit the pads. The umpire Vrinda Rathi turned down the lbw appeal and Smriti Mandhana sent the matter upstairs. To the naked eye, the ball seemed to be missing the stumps clearly after pitching on leg stump. 

However, the ball tracking projected the ball to be hitting the middle stump and the umpire had to reverse her decision much to the delight of the RCB players and the fans. Alyssa Healy, the UPW captain was standing at the other end, and she was in disbelief alongside Chamari and was seen telling the umpire, " No way." No doubt the UP Warriorz coach John Lewis was not happy with the dismissal which also proved to be the turning point of the match and didn't mince words criticising the technology.

"You watch the ball with the naked eye, and you think it might pitch in line, just maybe. Then you look at the ball rotating, and well, it's rotating like a legspinner. There are not many legspinners that go towards that [other] side. It was a fascinating dismissal and a massive turning point for us in that game," Lewis said after the match. Ball tracking, in recent times, has come up with shocking projections with an incident taking place in the ongoing Test series between India and England related to Zak Crawley's decision in Rajkot.

Another incident happened in the ongoing edition of the Pakistan Super League (PSL) when ball tracking had clearly spotted the impact of the ball wrong in Rilee Rossouw's dismissal. The error was so evident that the Hawk-Eye had to tender an apology to the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) admitting the mistake.