ICC celebrates Star Wars Day with compilation of boundaries, captions video “May The Fours Be With You”

Every year 4 May is celebrated as Star Wars Day to commemorate the success of the sci-fi franchise. The International Cricket Council (ICC) joined the celebrations by sharing a tribute video. The video shared by ICC on Twitter shows batsmen hitting boundaries with full strength, but their bats have been replaced with lightsabers, the most commonly used weapon in the Star Wars franchise. The day, 4 May, was chosen after an iconic phrase from the film ‘May The Force Be With You’ which was translated ‘May The Fourth Be With You’. The caption of the video tweeted by ICC read, “May The Fours Be With You.”

The 52-second video starts with England cricketer Jos Buttler walking across the stumps to scoop Pakistan player Wahab Riaz during a match between both the teams in 2019 ICC World Cup. It also shows Indian skipper Virat Kohli playing an amazing upper-cut against West Indies’ Oshane Thomas during the same tournament. West Indies player Chris Gayle also features in the video doing the same to New Zealand’s Jimmy Neesham. The video also shows a smooth cover drive by Thailand women’s team player Nattakan Chantham, and a sweep shot against Ravichandran Ashwin by Fakhar Zaman. According to an origin story recognized by Lucasfilm, the producers of Star Wars, the phrase ‘May The Fourth Be With You’ first was used on May 4, 1979, the day Margaret Thatcher took over as the British Prime Minister. CNN reported that the Conservative party allegedly placed an ad in the London Evening News which read, “May the Fourth Be With You, Maggie. Congratulations.”