Did the Brisbane T20I involve any mistake or cheating?

Hosts Australia have taken a 1-0 lead in the three-match T20I series against Pakistan after winning the rain-curtailed Brisbane T20I on Thursday (November 14). However, there was a controversy, and some cricket fans were confused and surprised by the incident. 

The series-opener Brisbane T20I was shrunk to a 7-over contest. Australia scored 93/4, thanks to the powerful batting from Glenn Maxwell (43 off 19 balls) and Marcus Stoinis (21 not out off 7 balls). 

In reply, Pakistan scored 64/9 in seven overs, where Xavier Bartlett (3/13) and Nathan Ellis (3/9) took three wickets each, while Adam Zampa (2/11) and Spencer Johnson (1/29) shared the other three wickets.

The Controversy

In the first innings, Pakistan used four bowlers. After Shaheen Shah Afridi and Haris Rauf completed their two-over quotas, Naseem Shah delivered the final over of the innings, which was his second over of the match. As Abbas Afridi bowled one over (2/9), Pakistan used four bowlers in the game.

Some cricket fans raised questions in that innings as Pakistan didn’t use the five bowlers in the innings. Even before the toss, the broadcasters also clarified that two bowlers can deliver a maximum of two overs each, and three other bowlers can deliver one over each. 

In fact, if we look at the second innings of the match, Australia also used the same tactics as Johnson, Bartlett, and Ellis bowled two overs each before Zampa delivered the last over. 

Usually, in limited-over matches, a team must use five bowlers (excluding a team’s innings was interrupted and not possible to restart their innings). In the shortened limited-over matches, the total overs have been divided between five bowlers, and some bowlers can deliver one additional over to make up the balance in the case of total overs not being divisible by five.

Special rule

However, T20I cricket has a special rule to allow each team to complete the innings with less than five bowlers in special cases.  

The ICC playing condition 13.9.4 claims, “for innings of rescheduled length of between 5 and 9 overs, no bowler may bowl more than two overs.” In this special condition, there is no requirement to use at least five bowlers if the innings are rescheduled between 5 and 9 overs.

So, the umpires and both the teams didn’t make any mistakes. However, the broadcasters made mistakes that brought more confusion to the cricket fans. 

In fact, it wasn't the first time we experienced it. The 2017 Thiruvananthapuram T20I between India and New Zealand also experienced a similar incident, where the Blackcaps used four bowlers, and each bowled two overs in the 8-over innings.