Leg bye

From ArticleWorld

A leg bye is scored in cricket when a batsman fails to strike the ball with his bat, but the ball ricochets off of another part of the batsman’s protective equipment, leading to a run being scored.

Definition

The leg bye is never attributed to the batsman that the ball struck, but is instead put down as an extra. These extras, which include wide balls and no balls as well as other less regular rulings, are added to the total of the batting teams overall score, usually appearing at the foot of the score sheet. The leg bye usually occurs as the result of a ball striking the batsman deflecting its course away from fielders thus allowing the batsmen to run. Balls from a fast bowler are particularly susceptible to leg byes due to the increased speed, which optimises the deflection and allows the ball to run further, even to the boundary. Whenever a run is made from a leg bye they are immediately counted as extras and not as a run for the batsman.

Dead Ball

Leg byes can only be counted if the batsman is either attempting to hit the ball or is evading a loose ball. If the umpire is not convinced that either of these criteria has been met, the bowl will count as a dead ball and no runs can be scored from the bowl. If the batter decides to run they may still be run out by a fielder, but on competition of the run the umpire will signal a dead ball and send the batsmen to their respective creases, voiding any runs created. Leg byes are a part of the original rules of cricket, but in more recent times they have become a heavily criticised part of the game. Critics claim that this method of points scoring requires little or no skill making it a very easy and cheap method of gaining runs.