Fake controversy has stemmed from both sides of the world after the second Ashes Test at Lord's.

It has led to coach Brendon McCullum suggesting the English won't be having a beer anytime soon with the victorious Australians, and for captain Ben Stokes to suggest he would have withdrawn an appeal.

We don't need to tell you what happened. Mitchell Starc took a catch one day that was disputed heavily, and then Jonny Bairstow was stumped on the next, walking out of his crease at the end of an over so quickly that the umpires hadn't even managed to call over.

Full disclosure, I've been umpiring cricket for the best part of eight years, and I'm here to tell you definitively that there was not a single ounce of controversy at Lord's.

In fact, the closest controversy got was when the on-field umpires decided they needed to send Jonny Bairstow's stumping upstairs - he was out of his crease by a distance great enough to be seen from the moon.

Firstly, Mitchell Starc's catch.

Australians have forgotten rather quickly just how much whinging occurred from this side of the world at the end of Day 4 with social media full of accusations at English supporters after Day 5.

Starc was ruled to have not held a chance in the outfield on English batsman Ben Duckett at the end of Day 4.

And despite one claim I read suggesting "Marais Erasmus should never be allowed to umpire again," the simple fact is that he got the decision 100 per cent right based on the laws of the game.

The caught law stipulates the ball must not hit the ground at any point before the catch is completed.

Law 33.3 clarifies that a catch is:

"The act of making a catch shall start from the time when the ball first comes into contact with a fielder's person and shall end when a fielder obtains complete control over both the ball and his/her own movement."

Starc never had control of his own movement before the ball hit the ground. He was always on the move, then falling or sliding to the ground.

The laws of the game are frankly what they need to be. Starc let the ball hit the grass before completing the catch, and there is a very real chance that if he had of turned his arm around to avoid that result, the ball would have bobbled out of his grasp when his elbow made contact with the ground.

That is a basic happening which has been seen time and time again, but by keeping his hand facing down, Starc essentially used the ground to complete the catch.

There is simply no way that it can be a catch, and while some get the point, the fact of the matter is, social media was filled with insults at the umpires and English fans telling Australians that "the laws are the laws."

But boy was the shoe on the other foot during Day 5.

Jonny Bairstow, batting in a horror situation for the English as they looked to rescue the game and secure what would have been the unlikeliest of victories, elected to leave his crease almost immediately at the end of an over.

The ball was never dead though. Alex Carey didn't have time to adjust into anything other than an underarm at the stumps, with the bails coming off and Bairstow - hilariously for Australian fans and not so much for English ones - walking off down the pitch like he was on his casual Sunday stroll to pick up the morning coffee.

Like in the caught law, the laws which govern when the ball shall become dead are also exceptionally clear.

Under law 20, the ball is dead when the ball is "finally settled" in the hands of the wicket-keeper or bowler, or when it has become clear to the bowler's end umpire that both the fielding side and batting side have ceased to regard it in play.

Evidently, the Australians never ceased to regard it as in play on the Bairstow dismissal, with Carey throwing the stumps down, and nor was the ball ever finally settled.

Carey never once delayed his movement in collecting the ball and under-arming it back at the stumps.

Ultimately though, it's a matter of opinion for the umpire, who is the only person on the ground, or the planet, watching the game that matters, and in this instance, he believed the ball was still live.

As a batsman, the first thing you are taught is to stay in your crease until the ball is clearly dead, or until a call of over is made.

That didn't happen for Bairstow, and he paid the price with his wicket.

It's easy to take the moral high ground when you're on the wrong side of events, as England were overnight, with Stokes and McCullum both screaming blue murder at the Australians and anyone else who would listen.

Examples have quickly come out regarding when either England or McCullum have attempted similar in recent, or not-so-recent times.

England themselves ran out New Zealander Colin de Grandhomme in similar fashion last year after an LBW shout, with the nation electing not to withdraw the appeal, as Stokes suggested he would have at the end of play on Day 5.

McCullum himself ran out Muttiah Muralitharan during his own career as he stepped out of his crease to celebrate a century to Kumar Sangakkara. It's not the only time he did it either, with at least two other accounts of similar behaviour from the former New Zealand keeper surfacing during his career.

This isn't a hit piece on McCullum or the English, but it's hard not to mention given the comments directed at the Australians last night, when all the visitors did was play within the laws of the game, which was then officiated to the letter of the law book by the umpiring team.