In professional cricket, “bye” and “leg bye” refer to scoring runs without the batter making contact with the ball using the bat. Today, we will know these rules in a very detailed way.
Bye
1) Definition: A “bye” occurs when the ball bypasses the batter without touching the bat or body, and the wicketkeeper fails to gather it. This allows the batter to get some runs.
2) Scoring: The runs from “bye” contribute to the team’s total but aren’t added to the batter’s score. They appear on the scoreboard as “byes.”
3) Example: If a fastball eludes the batter and the wicketkeeper and reaches the boundary, the team is awarded four byes, or the batters can run to score.
Leg Bye
1) Definition: A “leg bye” happens when the ball strikes the batter’s body (excluding the bat or gloves), and the batters choose to run. The delivery must be legal, and the bat must not be contacted first.
2) Scoring: Runs scored as leg byes are added to the team’s total, but it is not mentioned in the batter’s tally.
3) Condition: Leg byes are only awarded if the batter made a genuine attempt to play a shot or avoid being hit by the ball.
4) Example: If the ball hits the batter’s thigh pad and the batter runs a single, it’s recorded as a leg bye.
Key Points:
1) Byes and leg byes add to the team’s score but not to the batter’s runs.
2) If the batter doesn’t attempt to play a shot, the umpire may disallow leg byes, and no runs are given to the team or the batter.
