An umpiring error may have cost Tasmania a valuable 30 minutes of play on Day 3 of the Sheffield Shield clash with NSW in Hobart, but Tigers' captain George Bailey could afford to be philosophical about it with his team on top going into the final day's play on Thursday.
In a match already shortened due to several rain delays on Day 2, Bailey said he believed umpires had misinterpreted the conditions of play in commencing at 11.30am – not 11am – in the vital twilight clash at Blundstone Arena.
"I think the umpires just made a mistake," he said. "Normal start times you add half an hour on at the start and half an hour at the end, but a special rule for the twilight games is you're supposed to add the extra time on at the start and add on in the first session and the middle session."
"It's probably going to cost us eight overs which could be important in a game like this."
"The umpires have apologised for it and to be fair as a captain I should be aware of it too, so I'm certainly not pointing the whole blame at them."
Further compounding the issue was that bad light stopped play at 7pm, half an hour before the scheduled close, stopping the Tigers in their tracks when they had the Blues looking shaky at 4-75 after conceding first innings points to the home team during the afternoon session.
James Faulkner (3-34) and Jackson Bird (1-32) made inroads into the Blues middle order during the final session, bowling with pace and aggression to put Tasmania within sight of a valuable outright victory.
"It's a tough little time to bat there that twilight period and I thought we had our tail up at the end and I certainly thought we were making the running and we were on top of the game. Hopefully that's still the case in the morning."
Faulkner in particular continued his excellent form with the ball, but it was the captain's own performance that caught the eye during an entertaining day's play.
He cracked 117 from 140 balls to turn the game in his team's favour, following up from a dashing 94 in the Ryobi Cup fixture on Saturday.
"I'm feeling pretty good," Bailey said of his own form. "It was nice to sort of get the game going in our direction a bit today. I tend to like it when that sort of situation arises. You don't have to worry about what you're doing personally, you just worry about getting the team into a reasonable position so that suited me."
"It's nice to score runs because hopefully it's helping Tassie win games."