Australia tries for sneaky stumping of Pakistan, a breakdown
What Happened
In a tense moment during the first Test match between Australia and Pakistan, the home team tries to pull off a sneaky stumping attempt. The action unfolds in the 34th over, with Pakistani batsman Imam-ul-Haq facing 113 balls and scoring 39 runs so far. Australian all-rounder Marnus Labuschagne fields the ball and quickly flips it to wicket-keeper Alex Carey, who attempts to run out Imam-ul-Haq while the batsman's foot is in the air. The Australian players celebrate, thinking they've pulled off a clever dismissal, but Carey soon realizes the bails haven't been disturbed and Imam is still safe. "I hit him. The bells didn't move. I hit him," Carey is heard saying, acknowledging that while he made contact with the stumps, it wasn't enough to dislodge the bails and complete the stumping. The replay shows Carey's gloved hand gently hitting the stumps, but the batsman's foot was still grounded before the contact was made. The commentators note that for a stumping to be successful, the batsman's foot must be completely off the ground when the wickets are broken. In this case, Imam-ul-Haq's foot had just barely touched down again before Carey made the attempted dismissal. "Maybe there's, like, some inner conscious to Alex Carey here, the wicketkeeper, because he had the controversial stumping of Bearstone," the analyst observes, referencing a previous incident that may have made Carey hesitant to commit fully to the play. Two overs later, Australian spinner Nathan Lyon does manage to dismiss Imam-ul-Haq, this time cleanly bowling him with a leg-break delivery that beats the batsman's attempted shot. David Warner takes the catch, and the replay shows the sharp spin and extra bounce that led to the clean dismissal. The failed stumping attempt and the successful bowling dismissal highlight the fine margins and strategic nuances of Test cricket, with both teams looking to gain any advantage they can in the closely-contested match.
Full Transcript
Click timestamps to jump to that momentAustralia is hosting Pakistan for a summer tour,
and they tried to get a little sneaky on them in the first test match.
This breakdown is brought to you by DraftKings.
Just a fun little moment here where the ball goes to Marnus,
flips it to Alex Carey.
He hits the stumps.
They all celebrate.
They all go, wait, what?
What happened?
Alex, did you hit the stumps?
And the keeper with the gloves on, he's like, I hit him.
The bells didn't move.
I hit him.
But, yeah, I told you, I hit it.
Nothing happened.
And so here's what happened.
The ball comes in.
The batsman, his name is Shafiki.
Is that how you say it?
He's faced 113 balls, scored 39 runs.
They want to get him out.
He just blocks that one.
It goes right to Marnus, who's going to no-look backhand it to the keeper,
Carey, as he's going, Alex, right to him.
Batter doesn't see that they've done that.
Now the keeper is going to wait until he picks his foot up because he has to be
behind that white line, but he has to be touching the ground.
If he's, like, in the air, even if he was to get scared of the ball and jump
and they hit the wickets, he'd be out.
He's got to be grounded.
So he's waiting, waiting gently.
And then he hits the wood.
And maybe there's, like, some inner conscious to Alex Carey here,
the wicketkeeper, because he had the controversial stumping of Bearstone.
He's like, I don't know, man.
Or it's like, hey, if we're going to sneakily get you out,
I'll sneakily touch the wood.
But nothing happens.
And they're like, what are you doing?
You didn't touch him hard enough.
And I actually like that you can hear the stump mics and you can hear all the
everything.
They're saying, oh, oh, oh, oh, the no look pass is great.
Martin's is great hands.
I've done a lot of videos on him.
And then look at this.
And I think even if it went to review, which it didn't, they're like, well,
it's not review that.
But if you split screen it up, I think he actually gets his foot down before
he really flicks the stump.
I don't know if they look at reviews this closely.
Watch the foot's kind of in the air there.
I don't even know if it looks like it is in the air.
Cause you're going to see it come down and he still hasn't hit the wood.
And now I think the foot just came down.
So let's go back a little bit.
I think the foot comes down right there where you can see his toes kind of,
you know, the rest of the foot moves, his toes don't.
And he hasn't hit the wood yet.
Hits the wood there.
And he just very gently touches it.
Now there's these bales on top of the stumps and they have to get disturbed
and move for it to be out.
You can't just hit the stumps.
So he could have just taken it and whack this.
Thumbs and got him out.
But maybe there's like, I don't know, some interconscious everything.
I don't want another controversy on my hands after the ashes,
or he's just trying to be sneaky and like gentlemanly,
or it's just like a gentle reminder.
Hey, we're going to do this.
I guess Martin's fucking tossed me the ball.
I didn't want to do it.
Anyway, two overs later,
lion gets his man the correct way,
right to Warner who makes the catch.
And let me see, let me see.
He's a right-hander and that's a leg break.
I think in cricket, they, they,
they named the pitches designed on, um,
where they start.
And in baseball, it's where they end up.
Like we say back foot slider,
and they would call that like an outside slider.
I don't know.
I always get tripped up on this because it's,
it's different in baseball and cricket,
uh, from the point of view of breaking pitches.
So that pitch from line, he's right-hander.
It's going to drop.
And then we would say, you know,
like, um, a change up or screwball is going to drop in the arm side run.
See, we would, we would say,
we say it from the pitcher because we say arm side run and they say it from
the batter leg break or off break, which is opposite of leg break.
Yeah, that's it.
We say it from the pitcher.
They said better.
It goes that way.
He's trying to hit that.
The mid wicket misses edges.
Warner takes the catch.
Look at the spin.
Boom.
Hits the ground.
It goes even more.
Got past him a little bit.
Didn't get in the middle.
He's out.
No trickery about that.
Besides the trickery in the pitch,
which spun a trickier way than he thought it was going to spin.
The end of this video,
I really suffered.
And thanks to DraftKings for sponsoring the video.
I appreciate them.
Appreciate you guys for watching.
Appreciate people that don't even,
uh,
understand cricket and watch this.
You guys are the best.