Ian Gould
On the second day of the Oval Test between England and New Zealand a long running feature of Test Match Special (Radio 5 and web) returned.
The feature ran until 2024 with former International Test Umpire John Holder. However when he decided to leave the crease, it did not appear in 2025.
It has now reappeared with Ian Gould former Middlesex player and then a member of the ICC Elite Umpires Panel.
Ask The Umpire fills the lunch time slot in the TMS Day, and runs for around 30 minutes. Typically the Umpire answers questions from listeners on the quirky world of cricket and issues that arise with the numerous Laws of Cricket.
On Thursday one question was about a player with a toupe that became detached in windy conditions and prevented a ball from reaching the boundary. Ian Gould ruled that this was not something that came under the obstruction of play.
This led Jonathan Agnew on to a question from the Beard Liberation Front
A player edges a ball to a slip fielder with a long W G Grace style beard. The ball lodges in the beard, but then after an interval of a few seconds drops to the ground without the fielder touching it.
Is the batsman out?
Ian Gould’s view was that the batter would be out as the beard was attached to a player and this was the key point not the use of the hands
Aggers went on to reference an historic Ask The Umpire question from the BLF about players in a slip cordon intertwining their beards to catch a ball.
At this point one suspects Ian Gould may have started to wonder what he had got himself into…
Link to recording
Kmflett's Blog 
I’d thought that, for a catch to be legal, the catcher had to be in control of the ball for a certain time. Isn’t that the case?
yes, but if the ball is in the beard what’s to say they aren’t in control. I thought the amount of time might be an issue but Ian Gould didn’t think so
Well, W.G. Grace’s beard looked as though it might be prehensile (and Merv Hughes’ moustache)… I think that time must be involved, as part of the definition of “being in complete control”, though looking at Rule 33 I see that the length of time is left unspecified. I tried Rule 28, but it sheds no further light on the matter.