New Delhi: Australia and Sri Lanka faced off each other on June 19, during the third ODI at Colombo’s R Premadasa Stadium, with the Lankan squad winning the game by six wickets and nine balls, leading the series by 2-1.
While all was going good for host Sri Lanka, what made the day for cricket lovers was an incident from the match, a video of which went viral on social media hours after the game concluded.
The video shows Umpire Kumar Dharmasena going for a catch at square leg, but then quickly remembering not to do so for obvious reasons.
Apart from the now-viral clip, various fans have been flooding Twitter with snaps of Dharmasena cupping his hands in a gesture to take the catch, with his eyes on the ball.
Cricket Australia too posted a pic of the umpire with caption, “Catch! Umpire Kumar Dharmasena looks like he wants to get into the action… Thankfully he didn’t”.
Catch! Umpire Kumar Dharmasena looks like he wants to get into the action…
Thankfully he didn’t #SLvAUS pic.twitter.com/M4mA1GuDW8
— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) June 19, 2022
Meanwhile, former Sri Lanka cricketer Russell Arnold also took to Twitter and wrote, “He timely remembered that he is NOT an SL player anymore”.
Watch:
Kumar Dharmasena going for a catch in SL vs Aus Odi match pic.twitter.com/DYyxn6kEsy
— Sportsfan Cricket (@sportsfan_cric) June 20, 2022
Here’s how Twitter reacted:
He timely remembered that he is NOT an SL player anymore… ?
— Akhil ?? (@akhil_131) June 19, 2022
Going back to his days, man! ? https://t.co/tR9CzxRHt4
— NusandNas (@NusandNas) June 19, 2022
Luckily he remembered last second his job is not to catch it ?? https://t.co/67LkaOUiJy
— Rach? (@rhoftonphoto) June 19, 2022
and the batsman had his heart in his mouth for a moment!
— Don’t Yell @ me! ? (@gbenhur) June 19, 2022
When you are fed-up of doing umpiring and becomes a cricketer on the spot..
— Abhishek Agarwal (@Abhi_2570) June 19, 2022
Who would have thought dropping a catch would win hearts… All have to succumb to the instinctives… ?
— Raja Sekhar Reddy P (@Raji129112) June 20, 2022
However in the video, the latter quickly dropped the idea and let a Sri Lankan player field the shot.
