by Abhishek Mukherjee

Here is an anecdote from the 'Grovel' summer of 1976.

England were 145/6 in the ODI at Scarborough. At the crease were Graham Barlow and Alan Knott.

Now Knott played a leg-glance. The ball went to Michael Holding at long-leg. And Holding knocked out the stumps at the striker's end with a direct throw.

However, Barlow had made it. So far there had been nothing unusual. Barlow probably heard the ball hit the stumps. Or he probably saw it. Whatever it was, he set off to take advantage of the overthrow.

What he had not taken into account was that it was a Michael Holding throw – and in 1976 Holding was at his fiercest.

The missile hit the stumps so hard that it hit ricocheted towards the non-striker's end and dislodged the bails there too – yes, Holding's throws used to be *that* fierce!

This left both batsmen and both umpires confused. Amidst all this, Clive Lloyd appealed.

Arthur Jepson and David Constant had a long conference before ruling both men not out. Jepson explained that the batsman had made his ground at the striker's end, and for some reason the dislodging of bails at the bowler's end did not count.

They probably made a mistake. After all, they had never seen anything like that.

But then, who had?