Evin Lewis laughed off the no-ball incident, says Kieron Pollard 

What’s the story?

Kieron Pollard recently drew criticism for his apparent no-ball to deny Evin Lewis his fourth T20 century and also the second fastest ton in T20 cricket. He overstepped the bowling crease by a fair margin and Lewis was stranded on a score of 99 runs.

Nevertheless, in a recent interview with Sports Max, Pollard said that Lewis took the incident on a lighter note. "I just told him (Lewis) 'well played and good luck in the playoffs. He just laughed it off. Evin Lewis... he came up after me in Trinidad to play cricket. We play cricket together. Our whole management is the same sort of management,” Pollard revealed.

During the interview, Pollard also put emphasis on his approach towards the game. "At the end of the day, (people may claim) Kieron Pollard is jealous of Evin Lewis and things like that. That's not in my nature. I have been the first one to congratulate somebody. I have been the first one to send him a message and always be there no matter what. And this is not going to stop me from continuing to do that.”

In case you didn’t know…

St Kitts & Nevis Patriots and Barbados Tridents clashed in a group stage encounter earlier this month. Tridents set them a modest target to chase down. However, Chris Gayle and Evin Lewis took the Tridents’ bowlers to the cleaners and traced the target down with as many as 78 balls to spare.

The heart of the matter

In the interview, Pollard also said that in an attempt to try something different, the no-ball occurred and it wasn’t intentional. He tried to bowl a short-pitched delivery and therefore strived for that extra bit to dig in the bouncer.

Pollard claimed that it was in an effort to get Lewis out and not to stop him to get to his ton. Nevertheless, in that attempt, his front-foot stride breached the bowling crease. Consequently, he was highly criticised by the cricketing fraternity.

Reactions

After the incident, quite expectantly, Twitter went berserk.

Denying a century by bowling a no ball ?not got sportsmanship @KieronPollard55. Evin Lewis deserved it after some tremendous hitting #CPL17

— Vishnu (@VishnuVvce) September 4, 2017

The reason why I don't like Mumbai Indians is coz of few players who overact on d field & Kieron Pollard is one amongst those. WHAT A LOSER?

— Abhir Singh Bhatia (@BhatiaAbhir) September 4, 2017

Just lost a lot of respect for Kieron Pollard. Awful sportsmanship, got to be on purpose that

— Daniel Green (@DannyG94) September 4, 2017

While what #KieronPollard did last night is disgusting at all levels. What is shameful is that Evin Lewis is young and a fellow #trini!

— Denise Besai (@deniseb1305) September 4, 2017

Author’s take

Kieron Pollard is an experienced campaigner in the T20 format and he should be matured enough to understand the right approach towards the game. If it wasn’t intentional, then it’s well and good for Pollard. However, if it’s a strategical move, then it’s not something Pollard should be proud of.

At the end of the day, it was Evin Lewis who suffered the consequence of the no-ball. He is a class act in the limited overs format and deserved the ton.