Published By: Sayan Guha

Year Ender 2024: ICC T20 World Cup and THESE Controversial Moments That Sparked an Outrage

As the year comes to an end, we take a look back at some of the most significant moments in the world of sports

2024 is now a matter of merely two weeks as we prepare to bring the curtain down this year and welcome a new one, i.e., 2025. This year, we, the Indian sports enthusiasts, were in for a treat, given we witnessed India achieving success in several sports and tournaments. However, the year also witnessed several controversies that may not be directly associated with an Indian outfit but in competitions related to India.

For example, the ICC Men's T20 World Cup that India won earlier this year gave birth to a number of controversial moments, including Suryakumar Yadav's game-winning catch in the finale that was questioned by many.

As the year comes to an end, check out some of the top controversial moments from the ICC T20 Men's World Cup that sparked an outrage.

Four-run short

The Bangladesh cricket team was certainly not happy about how Mahmudullah's LBW incident was handled against South Africa. In the 17th over, when Mahmudullah was adjudged an LBW, a DRS was opted by the Bangladesh team. While the Bangla boys were happy that the decision was overturned, they did not appreciate the fact that the four leg-byes were taken away from Bangladesh. The result was that Bangladesh lost the game by four runs. Bangladesh would've won the game if those four leg-byes had not been taken away.

Sponsors over fans

For the Uganda cricket team, their debut in the T20 World Cup tournament left a bitter taste. To celebrate the milestone, the Ugandan Cricket Association (UCA) chose a jersey designed by a cricket fan. However, this design carried a bold feather pattern, which made the sponsor logos less visible. The ICC raised this concern, and Uganda had to change its jersey at the last minute. Given sponsor logos are a stream of significant revenue, sponsors became the priority over the game's fans.

Stop scratching!

A game between the United States of America and PAK witnessed pacer Haris Rauf getting accused of ball tampering by pacer Juan "Rusty" Theron. Theron took to the social media platform X, on which he wrote, "ICC, are we just going to pretend Pakistan isn't scratching the hell out of this freshly changed ball? Reversing the ball that's just been changed 2 overs ago? You can literally see Haris Rauf running his thumbnail over the ball at the top of his mark." He also tagged the official X account of the International Cricket Council (ICC).

Catch of the tourney

While Suryakumar Yadav's catch to dismiss David Miller was a pretty straightforward affair, one section of fans turned it into a controversial moment, stating that Yadav's feet had touched the boundary. What followed was a string of videos of the catch from multiple angles, which cleared up the fact that Yadav had not touched the boundary.

Even Yadav himself had to comment about the controversy, stating, "I didn't touch the line when I caught the ball in the final match against South Africa. We can't keep everyone happy. I did what occurred to me as correct. By the grace of God, I was there when the ball came towards me."

The tournament ended with India lifting the ICC T20 World Cup trophy after 17 years, while Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, and Ravindra Jadeja bid adieu to the T20 international format.