Fielding with a cloth

"One of the fielders was using a cloth to dry the wet ball between each delivery. He forgot to put the cloth in his pocket and the batsman hit the ball straight to him at mid-off. The fielder bent down and stopped the ball with the cloth in his hand. What was the umpire expected to do about this incident?"


The ball is automatically dead, but the umpire should call and signal Dead ball so that all the players know that the game has stopped.

He needs to award 5 penalty runs to the batting side by signalling to the scorers with his hand patting his opposite shoulder. The scorers need to be made aware of the number of runs to be recorded if the batsmen have run before the ball was illegally fielded. The ball does not count in the over and the batsman must be at their correct ends to receive the next ball. In the incident described the batsman did not cross and therefore stay at their original ends even though 5 runs (an odd number) have been added to the total scored.

The umpire should inform his colleague, the fielding captain and the batsmen at the crease what has happened. When the players next leave the field for an interval, the umpires should inform the batting captain about the incident.

The illegal fielding was a deliberate act and the umpires should report the incident to the Executive of the fielding side and the Governing Body responsible for the match.


Read more about Law 41 (The Fielder) at the MCC website