Is it a boundary or overthrows?

Question

Consider a scenario where a fielder is chasing a ball that is running away to the boundary. He puts in a dive, gets a hand to the ball but it runs over the boundary ropes. The umpire signals a boundary and 4 runs are awarded to the batting side.

Now, consider a scenario where two fielders are chasing a ball that is running away to the boundary. The first fielder slides, stops the ball and passes it to the second fielder who throws it back to the wicket keeper. The batting side is only awarded the number of runs that they run between the wickets.

My question is based on this third scenario. Two fielders are running behind the ball. The first slides, stops the ball and wants to pass it to the second fielder. But his throw misses the second fielder and the ball rolls over the boundary ropes.

How many runs will the batting side be awarded in this scenario?

Answer 1

Though in both, the first and third scenario's, the ball comes off the fielder's hand and goes to the boundary, they are treated differently. This is because in the first scenario, the fielder never had control of the ball that he was trying to stop where as in the third, the fielder had total control of the ball before he chose to throw it to this teammate. Therefore, these two cases are treated differently when it comes to runs awarded.

Law 19.7 states that,

Overthrow or wilful act of fielder

If the boundary results from an overthrow or from the wilful act of a fielder the runs scored shall be

(i) any runs for penalties awarded to either side and

(ii) the allowance for the boundary and

(iii) the runs completed by the batsmen, together with the run in progress if they had already crossed at the instant of the throw or act.

The third scenario of the question is treated as overthrows and the batsman will be awarded the combined runs of scenario 1 and scenario 2. In effect, he will score the number of runs run between the wickets plus a boundary.