Simon
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Laws of Cricket Question 4A bowler bowls a legal ball. The batsman sweeps the ball straight at a close fielder wearing a helmet. The ball rebounds off the helmet onto the strikers stumps while the striker is out of his ground. The ball is then caught by a fielder without touching the ground. The fielder notices that the non-striking batsman is out of his crease and throws at, and hits, the stumps at the bowlers end. The fielding side shout 'howzat'.
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Simon
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The answerWell done to the two of you that said 'give the non-striker out run out'.
I am glad that no-one fell for the obvious wrong answer of 'give both batsmen out' as there is not a situation in cricket where both batsmen can be given out off the same ball as once one batsman is out the ball automatically becomes dead.
The key to this answer is what happens when the ball hits the helmet being worn by the fielder. Laws 32.3 and 38.2 state that if the ball hits the fielders helmet then the ball does not become dead but the batsman cannot be given out caught or be given out run out in the case of a direct deflection back onto his stumps.
So in this case you cannot give the striking batsman out either caught or run out. You cannot give him out bowled because the ball has made contact with another person (i.e. the fielders helmet). You would not call 'dead ball' just because it hit the helmet being worn by the fielder and there is no other reason stated for deeming the ball 'dead'.
That leaves us with two other possibilities - Give the striker out run out or give no-one out. If, as in this case, the non-striking batsman is out of his ground as the stumps are broken by the fielders throw then he is out and should be given out on appeal.
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bailbreaker
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simon, using the same criteria what would be the outcome if the fielder did not have a helmet on?
barry
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Simon
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I suspect he would be taking a trip to the Hospital!
In all seriousness though, that is a very good question.
If the fielder wasn't wearing a helmet or it hit him somewhere else (like his collarbone Deano) the striking batsman could be out caught or run out.
The dismissal of 'caught' takes precedence over all others apart from being bowled so even though the run out of the striking batsman happened first you would give the striking batsman out 'caught'.
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