England pacer James Anderson criticised Deepti Sharma and India for Charlotte Dean’s run-out in the third and final ODI at Lord’s last month, with several present and former cricketers offering their say on the mode of dismissal.
With England needing 17 with a wicket in hand, Deepti ran Dean out for backing up at the non-striker’s end to seal India’s third straight win. The India all-rounder later revealed that the batter had been warned beforehand, while skipper Harmanpreet Kaur reflected that the dismissal was “within the laws”.
Anderson, who has voiced his opinion on running out the batter for backing up in the past, maintained his stance.
“Within 30 seconds of thinking about it (the mode of dismissal), I was fuming,”
he said on BBC’s Tailenders podcast.
“It infuriates me because I’ve been brought up in teams where we wouldn’t even consider doing something like that. And yes, it’s in the laws of the game, and they’ve changed it and it’s a run-out now.
But whether it is Burnley under-11s or an England team… No. I hope people are just going to stay in their crease now. Just don’t give people the option to do it.”
Anderson further criticised the Indian team for showing no “compassion”, while acknowledging Dean’s fighting knock.
“This comes under the Spirit of Cricket. I really didn’t like Charlie Dean in tears at the end, – it was a tense situation and she was dealing with it amazingly and this thing happens – and she would have felt anger,”
Anderson said.
“She was in tears, and the handshake from the Indian team at the end – there wasn’t any compassion there at all, they didn’t even look her in the eye. (When asked if the Indians felt guilty) Don’t do it then. They had the option, the captain had the option of saying no. [But] The captain was happy with it.”