The one-word answer seemingly is- yes.
There is no doubt DRS ticks plenty of boxes but given where a review system in cricket has the potential to be, the DRS is presently languishing.
The point is not that there should be no reviews, and wrong decisions should be allowed to stand. In principle, no one wants wrong decisions to be there, and of course, there should be an option to have those wrong decisions overturned after reviews.
However, the system that ICC has implemented for those reviews is alarmingly flawed. It’s as if the ICC is afraid of getting decisions too right, and wants there to be a room for error in place. Why?
Take the example of the recent Adam Voges no-ball incident against New Zealand in the first Test of the ongoing series. Adam Voges had just walked into bat, and was on 7 when he misjudged the line of a delivery from Doug Bracewell and opted to leave the ball.
The ball nipped back in to take the top of off stump. As far as bowling goes, it was just the perfect delivery. It was the delivery every coach at every level has told every seam bowler to strive for.
Bracewell had bowled that perfect delivery and had got the desired result too, but the umpire, Richard Illingworth, deemed it a no ball. Replays showed, however, that it was not a no-ball, and that Bracewell had bowled a perfectly legal delivery, as some part of his landing foot was definitely behind the line.
Sadly, there was no recourse available to New Zealand to have the mess sorted out. Everyone now knew that the umpire had been wrong, including the umpire himself, but there was nothing anyone could do about it.
That's how shockingly limited the scope of review under the DRS system is. There will be those who will come up with the cliched and frankly by now stale response of – but the technology didn’t fail, it's the humans.
It doesn’t matter. The point is, that right now under DRS, there is no provision for such errors to be corrected. Regardless of whether it was a human error or a mechanical error, under the present review system, the wrong decision stood.
That's how alarmingly limited the DRS can be. This is what the BCCI mean when they say this review system (DRS) is not comprehensive enough to be used. Their objection is not against reviewing and correcting wrong decisions, but against the limited system presently in place for doing so.
In light of the Voges decision where there is a lot of room for arguments, the present review system is just glaringly limited in its scope.
What is even more alarming is that the ICC is unwilling to learn any lesson and are not keen on pro-actively removing this limitation that presented itself. If anything, the stand of the ICC is just the opposite of what it should be.
Shortly after the Adam Voges ‘no ball that wasn’t a no ball’ incident, far from learning from the mistake, the ICC hurriedly issued a statement that reviews will continue to be unavailable for no ball decisions.
It's a case that brilliantly illustrates the closed mindset that ICC has towards reviews. Far from fixing the system once a clear error has occurred, or at least, a glaring lacuna has presented itself, the ICC cannot wait to announce status quo on the issue.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? It's a Latin saying which means who will guard the guards. The DRS is in place to help guard against wrong umpiring decisions, but when DRS itself is shown to be limited in scope, who is there guarding and fixing that?
The answer is no one, and at the very least, definitely not the ICC. This no ball incident is not the first time DRS has been called into question.
DRS has been called into question many times, both in regard to the Hot Spot and the ball-tracking mechanism. However, each time, far from helping achieve any clarity on the issue, ICC has been happy to play the ostrich and bury its head in the sand.
Hot Spot
Everyone remembers the controversy that Usman Khawaja’s dismissal had created during the Ashes in 2013. To refresh the memory, Usman Khawaja was ruled out caught behind during the third Ashes Test in Manchester, and very confident that he had not edged the delivery, Khawaja immediately reviewed the decision.
The replays seemed to confirm that Khawaja was right in reviewing the decision. The Hot Spot showed no mark on the bat to indicate that there had been any edge, and there was clear evidence of the bat clipping the pads to account for whatever noise the umpire may have heard.
Everyone waited patiently for the decision to be overruled on review, but much to everyone’s astonishment, the third umpire opted, for reasons best known to him, to stay with the original decision.
This infuriated the Australian camp to an extent that the then Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd also got involved in the controversy and called it the worst cricket umpiring decision he had ever seen.
The newspaper clippings from the period aptly demonstrated just how much outrage the incident had caused. One would think that lessons would have been learnt from this, but clearly, that was not the case, as just a few months later another high profile caught behind DRS error happened.
This time, it involved Joe Root and was very similar to the Usman Khawaja incident. Here is a video of the incident.
This Joe Root dismissal is eerily similar to the Usman Khawaja dismissal. Umpire rules the batsman out, batsman reviews, nothing shows up on Hot Spot, but the batsman is ruled out anyway.
Why were no lessons learned from the Usman Khawaja incident to ensure that the second error didn't happen? The ICC’s present stand on no-balls is a continuation of this lackadaisical stance it has always had on DRS.
ICC has never been pro-active on DRS and in correcting issues that crop up from time to time. ICC only reacts and even then, it doesn’t react fast enough or as much as it needs to.
It’s not as if these incidents have stopped. There have been many notable DRS errors with regard to catches, even as recently as a few months ago. There was a very notable error involving Nathan Lyon in the first Day-Night Test, where despite Hot Spot showing a clear mark on the bat while reviewing, the 3rd umpire still ruled the catch review as not out, baffling everyone.
ICC later admitted to the error and said that Lyon should have been ruled out. Ian Chappel tweeted he couldn’t believe what he just saw. The incident was deemed even more farcial by the fact that Nathan Lyon had started to walk off and stopped only after the on-field umpire ruled it as not out.
Brendon McCullum reviewed the decision and the 3rd umpire still ruled it not out despite that fact that there was a clear mark on the bat indicating Lyon had top-edged his sweep. Shane Warne Tweeted – “Obvious mark on hot-spot, Lyon clearly hit the ball on to his shoulder & he walked off the ground. Ridiculous waste of time & wrong decision.”
One would think Nathan Lyon’s decision is about as farcical as DRS could get, but later, in the recently finished Sri Lankan tour to New Zealand, things got even more farcical. This time, the incident involved Sri Lankan batsman Udara Jayasundara.
At least, in the earlier instances documented above the on-field umpire got it wrong, and then the review was botched up too. With the Jayasundera dismissal, the on-field umpire actually got it right, and then using the DRS, the initial correct decision was over-ruled and a wrong decision arrived at.
Is this development in the right direction? The ICC, far from learning from the errors, intends to sweep the errors as one-offs. Eventually, these errors have piled up to be just too many.
Hawk Eye
While the issues with catch related DRS are not fundamental-- but more due to not learning from the mistakes made and not enough corrective steps being taken-- the issues with ball tracking are rooted right at the very foundation itself.
With the Hawk-Eye technology, however, the accuracy of the technology itself is under question. This is the primary objection of the BCCI to its use.
Now I know this statement raises a lot of eyebrows, and people would say that Tennis uses it too. Why, then, has no one ever heard complaints in Tennis about the accuracy of Hawk Eye?
To begin with, the use of Hawk-Eye in tennis is limited to merely tracking the ball upto the point that the ball bounced. Did it bounce inside the line or outside the line-- that's all tennis uses the Hawk-Eye for.
As long as the Hawk-Eye can relay this information, it’s all fine. What the ball does after bouncing is something tennis doesn’t bother itself with, and thus, the role of the Hawk-Eye in tennis is very restricted compared to cricket.
In cricket, however, the Hawk-Eye is used to determine not only where the ball bounced, but also how it moved after it bounced up to the point of impact with the pads.
And then, it also predicts how the ball would travel after the collision with the batsman’s pads. The issues with Hawk-Eye arise when it comes to tracking the ball after it has bounced.
BCCI’s chief objection is that how can the Hawk Eye tell the difference in bounce on a slow and low Indian pitch and a fast and bouncy track in Australia? Can the Hawk-Eye tell the difference between leg spin and off spin? Between in-swing and out-swing?
How can Hawk Eye account for all these variations in what the ball will do after it lands. Remember, these are things tennis doesn’t need the Hawk-Eye to do. The initial reaction that I always had to these reservations by BCCI was that BCCI is asking the wrong questions and raising incorrect objections.
Hawk-Eye doesn’t need to do all these things. Hawk-Eye merely tracks the ball as it pitches and up to the point of impact with the pads. Post-impact, the Hawk-Eye merely extends the trajectory it has already tracked up to the stumps.
So whatever variations are after pitching, whether the delivery is, off-spin or leg-spin, they are already tracked and accounted for by the Hawk-Eye.
The hidden flaws of the Hawk-Eye
That was until I came across an incident involving Phil Hughes during a Test match against Sri Lanka. Hughes was ruled out lbw and to the naked eye, on replays, it was clear that the ball had spun considerably towards the off side after pitching.
However when the Hawk-Eye graphics came up, it showed the ball would keep going on straight after pitching. This caused a lot of debate and eventually. Steve Carter, the MD of Hawk-Eye Innovations, admitted to the mistake. However what he said later was extremely alarming.
Steve Carter explained that the mistake had been the result of several factors and one of them was that the ball had travelled less than 40cm between pitching and striking Hughes' pad. Under Hawk-Eye's configuration for the Sri Lanka series, ball-tracking cannot be deemed conclusive if the distance between pitching and impact is less than 40cm.
Suddenly all of BCCI’s reservations about Hawk Eye having to account for the bounce on different surfaces became very real. If the ball pitched 40cm or less before impact with the batsman’s pads, then Hawk-Eye was struggling to pick up the path the ball took after pitching.
So, there was no question of it accurately extending that path up to the stumps. This inaccuracy could sometimes be so large, that Hawk-Eye could miss the ball spinning after pitching entirely and show it to be heading straight instead.
Having said that, how can the Hawk-Eye be trusted? The BCCI’s issues with Hawk Eye suddenly became all too real.
Just think of how many LBW reviews would fall in this less than 40 cm rule.
However, the story doesn’t end there. What Steve Carter further said was – “We are currently under instruction that the 40cm graphic shouldn't be displayed in the circumstances of the lbw appeal in question.”
In other words, the ICC has barred Hawk-Eye from showing a “less than 40 cm” rule caveat to the viewer, so no one ever knows whether he review in question falls within the margin of Hawk Eye’s error zone, and therefore should be taken with a pinch of salt.
In the absence of this caveat, when a review for one of these ‘less than 40 cm’ LBWs is done, and when the Hawk-Eye graphic appears and the line is drawn up to the stumps, the viewers take those lines with the same finality as they would take a catch being taken or a batsman’s stumps being knocked out, without knowing that those lines are potentially inaccurate.
That the umpires know this inaccuracy range is also debatable. If Hawk-Eye is struggling to pick up the actual trajectory of the ball, then how are those lines being drawn?
As a BCCI official once said, those lines of the Hawk-Eye are merely someone replacing the umpire’s imagination on how the ball would travel after impact, with his own imagination.
The contentious issue of ‘Umpire’s Call’
Let's now move to the graphic which shows what percent of the ball would hit the stumps and the one that makes all the difference between an ‘Out’ or an ‘Umpire’s Call’ decision.
51% of the ball hitting the stumps – OUT, 49% of the ball hitting the stumps – Umpire’s Call. For these Hawk-Eye graphics, there is a 2.2 mm error window. So all the close Hawk Eye calls where the ball is hitting or not hitting half the stumps by just a small margin, are basically within this error range.
How many of those do we get frequently where the ball up to 2.2 mm either way, that makes all the difference between decisions? Quite a lot!
And they are all in the error range. It’s astonishing how this information is kept hidden from the viewers who treat these lines as absolutely accurate.
This is why it cannot be stated hard enough that Hawk Eye’s implementation is flawed at the fundamental level itself. However, even if one were to ignore this error range, there are plenty of other issues with the Hawk-Eye that require urgent modification.
The biggest issue is with regard to the Umpire’s Call. The ICC needs to make up its mind on whether it wants correct calls made or almost correct calls made. Umpire’s Call is in place to allow room for reasonable human error. But why?
How is it any consolation to a bowler, whose LBW review was turned down on account of Umpire’s Call, that the umpire almost made the correct decision? There are plenty of LBW reviews from the bowling side where despite the ball hitting the stumps, the review is returned as Not-Out, just because it was the umpire’s call.
Just imagine if tennis adopted this strange method for ruling on line calls. The chair umpire rules a call OUT, and the aggrieved player reviews, and it’s found that the ball just (less than half the ball) clipped the line.
If tennis were to adopt cricket’s approach all these ‘just clipped the line’ reviews would result in Umpire’s Call and the ball would be ruled OUT.
In tennis, a ball is either IN or OUT, regardless of what the chair umpire ruled, and regardless of what portion of the ball is clipping the line. Similarly, in cricket, a ball is either hitting the stumps or it’s not, a ball has either struck the batsman in front of the stumps or it hasn’t.
Why is the ICC happy to deal in almosts and not go the full distance when it comes to trusting technology?
Umpire’s Call renders the whole review system meaningless, and that is why DRS needs urgent changes to be made to it. Being all for reviews is not enough, having a review system that works is equally important.
The BCCI seems to be the only cricket board in the world that wants both. Sadly, every other board and the ICC are happy with just the former and don’t really seem to care about having the latter.
The biggest issue with Umpire’s Call is that in the absence of two-way communication between the umpire who made the decision and the 3rd umpire reviewing the decision, any review that results in Umpire’s Call is essentially gibberish.
Here is why: An LBW review hinges (more often than not) on two aspects - 1) Whether the impact was in line of the stumps; and 2) Whether the ball was hitting the stumps.
Lets us consider an LBW appeal where the on-field umpire feels that the impact with the pads was outside the line of the stumps, but the ball would just (less than half the ball) clip leg stump.
The ball only partially hitting the leg stump is fine for the umpire and based on that alone, the umpire would rule the batsman Out. However since he feels the impact was outside the line of the stumps, he rules it as Not Out.
The fielding side reviews, and on review it’s found that the ball would just clip the leg stump like the umpire thought, but the umpire was wrong about impact with pads and that the impact was in line with the stumps and the umpire was wrong.
Now if the umpire knew this, he would rule it out. However, under the present review system, once the Hawk-Eye graphic shows the impact was in line with the stumps, the umpire will not even be asked if this was the ground on which he gave his decision.
Under the present system, it will be assumed that the on-field umpire knew that the impact was in line with the stumps, which is not the case at all. Further, under the present review system, it will be assumed that the umpire based his decision on the fact that he was unsure of whether the ball would hit the stumps or not, which was again not the case.
The umpire was sure that the ball would clip the stumps as it was shown to be doing, and it was not the basis of the original not out decision. However, since not enough of the ball is shown to be hitting the stumps, an Umpire’s Call will be returned, and the original Not-Out call will stand.
Here it’s clear that in the absence of communication between the on-field umpire and the reviewing umpire, a decision that should have been overturned on review is allowed to stand. There are potentially plenty of reviews that would fall under this category.
Sadly, despite the many grounds on which DRS fails, only BCCI wants something done about it. All other boards, in their ignorance, are happily promoting a faulty system, and ICC, the one who is to guard the guards, is happy to play the ostrich.
It’s clear that on a closer look the DRS is very clearly in need of changes urgently, but nobody except BCCI is doing anything.
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