India won a tiebreaking 2nd Super Over against Afghanistan in the 3rd (and final) match of their ongoing series at the Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore on January 17, 2024. After the teams were tied at 212 in two thrilling innings replete with powerful hitting, Afghanistan posted 16/1 in their Super Over against Mukesh Kumar, using Rahmatullah Gurbaz, Gulbadin Naib (fresh from his monster 55(23) to tie the match) and Mohammed Nabi. Rohit Sharma and Yashasvi Jaiswal opened the batting in India’s reply. With India’s score at 0/15 after 5 balls Rohit Sharma walked off Retired Out - forfeiting his wicket to allow the quicker Rinku Singh to act as runner for the last ball off which 2 were required. Jaiswal and Rinku managed a single only, and the first Super Over ended in a tie.
In my opinion calling this match a farce is not right. People can and should question whether the decision of Rohit Sharma coming back to bat was In spirit of the game or not. They then should also question the triple of the last ball of Afghanistans first super over, when Nabi ran the third knowing well enough that the ball had deflected of off him when he took the first run enabling them to make 2 extra runs. Had they not ran even the third run, India would have won the first super over as India then only needed 16 runs.
Also, the rules does state that
1) batsman can retire and comeback with the consent of opponent captain and not be ill, hurt, which could have happened, we don't know it didn't. Most probably it didn't happen.
2) the most probable scenario is that Rohit declared himself retired hurt and not out. He could absolutely claim he was experiencing cramps, as he had batted the first 20 and then fielded in Afg innings followed by super over and be retired out due to hurt/ illness. And the break between super over, as stated in rules, should be 5 min, which is quite enough to recover and bat 6 balls. Is that in spirit of the game, you can question that for sure, I would say it is not, but still it doesn't make this game a farce.
3) The claim of him being retired out is from ICC scoreboard which is not the official scorecard, Cricbuzz had marked him retired hurt and not out but they are also not official scorecard. The umpires would have to clarify that.
4)Even If you Ignore all the above reasons, how can anyone be sure that India, without Rohit, would have not made the 11 runs that they made. India could have sent out Rinku, Virat and Samson and made 11 or more or even less runs, nobody knows that. What we know for sure is that Afghanistan had the fair chance to make 11 runs and they came up short.
I think calling it a farce is doing disservice to the absolute blinder of a game it was and to the two teams that played it.
In my opinion calling this match a farce is not right. People can and should question whether the decision of Rohit Sharma coming back to bat was In spirit of the game or not. They then should also question the triple of the last ball of Afghanistans first super over, when Nabi ran the third knowing well enough that the ball had deflected of off him when he took the first run enabling them to make 2 extra runs. Had they not ran even the third run, India would have won the first super over as India then only needed 16 runs.
Also, the rules does state that
1) batsman can retire and comeback with the consent of opponent captain and not be ill, hurt, which could have happened, we don't know it didn't. Most probably it didn't happen.
2) the most probable scenario is that Rohit declared himself retired hurt and not out. He could absolutely claim he was experiencing cramps, as he had batted the first 20 and then fielded in Afg innings followed by super over and be retired out due to hurt/ illness. And the break between super over, as stated in rules, should be 5 min, which is quite enough to recover and bat 6 balls. Is that in spirit of the game, you can question that for sure, I would say it is not, but still it doesn't make this game a farce.
3) The claim of him being retired out is from ICC scoreboard which is not the official scorecard, Cricbuzz had marked him retired hurt and not out but they are also not official scorecard. The umpires would have to clarify that.
4)Even If you Ignore all the above reasons, how can anyone be sure that India, without Rohit, would have not made the 11 runs that they made. India could have sent out Rinku, Virat and Samson and made 11 or more or even less runs, nobody knows that. What we know for sure is that Afghanistan had the fair chance to make 11 runs and they came up short.
I think calling it a farce is doing disservice to the absolute blinder of a game it was and to the two teams that played it.