During a domestic one-day match on Wednesday, New Zealand opener Jeet Raval smashed a bowl back at medium-pacer and Canterbury captain Andrew Ellis at the Colin Maiden Park in Auckland. The ball hit the bowler on the forehead—an inch or so above his right eye and bounced off to clear the long-on boundary.

Even while considering the fact that the straight boundaries are very small at Auckland’s secondary domestic venue, this was a dramatic bit of footage. Ellis did take deceptive action by putting his hands up to cover his face, but his reflexes weren’t quick enough.

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Now, anyone getting hit on the head extracts a cringe from the audience after Phil Hughes’s death after the Australian batsman was hit on the back of the head. And Ellis did go off for tests after holding his head following the blow and being checked on by a very concerned Raval, who was playing for Auckland.

In a rather poetic twist of events, he did get rid of Raval finally with a short ball that the left-hander hooked to a fielder in the deep. By then, the opener had smashed 149 and hit three more sixes, none of which were remarkably headed over the boundary ropes like his first.

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Video of the incident

Though Ellis got away with a minor shake-up and was able to bowl again, there has been a growing concern of late over the safety of bowlers and umpires as the bats are getting bigger and better in the modern era of cricket. In international cricket, We’ve already seen some umpires wearing a helmet while at the non-striker’s end while Australian Bruce Oxenford has designed his own safety device on his hand—which is an Indian context looks to be inspired from the Amitabh Bachchan-starrer Shehenshah.

Here’s the video of the horrifying incident:

That is one tough nut. The stroke was recorded as 6, one bounce off Andrew Ellis's scone. Passed the concussion test & carried on….😬 #FordTrophy pic.twitter.com/2zsfLCI3qd

— #NZIII (@MargotButcher) February 20, 2018