Tony Becca - FROM THE BOUNDARY THE ICC Champions Trophy is well on the way and so far, so good.
As a contest, it is just beginning to hot up, and with the weak teams on the way home and the big boys now up against each other, it should be cricket, lovely cricket right through to the final.
Apart from the usual thrills of limited-overs cricket, one reason why it should be cricket, lovely cricket is the fact that from here on it is win or go home and that usually guarantees extraordinary effort in the bid to stay alive.
Another reason is that the contest should not be spoilt by poor officiating at least not as much as in the past.
In a bid to reduce the number of mistakes by umpires, the ICC is contemplating more use of technology to assist the umpires in making decisions, it is using the Champions Trophy to test a few experiments, so far there has been no problem, and although there are those who believe that more use of technology will cause endless problems and change the nature of the game, chances are there will be no problem not for the rest of the tournament or whenever it is introduced fully into the game at the international level.
EXPERIMENTS UNSURE
The reason for the experiments at the ICC Champions Trophy is simply to ensure, as much as possible, that when the umpire makes a decision, when he gives a batsman out, that it is the correct decision, and in this age of professional sports when so much is on the line, that must be the thing to do.
According to those opposed to the use of technology and therefore the third umpire, not only will that not be cricket, but also that will not solve the problem of wrong decisions.
To them, technology, the television, should never be used to assist the umpire for something like leg before wicket decisions for the simple reason that television will never ever be able, for example, to judge the bounce of the ball, and in that respect they are right.
The bounce of the ball is not the only important aspect to note in giving a leg before wicket decision, however. According to the rule, for an appeal for leg before wicket to be considered, the ball, for example, should have pitched in line with the leg stump and not outside the leg stump, and the television can certainly assist the umpire with that just as it can for all the line decisions, for stumpings, run outs and no balls.
For some time now, the third umpire has been used to assist the standing umpires when confronted with a close stumping or close a run out but not for a no ball even though the rule states that a batsman should not be bowled, leg before wicket, caught, stumped, etc., etc., off a no-ball and although many batsmen have been given out off no balls.
DISMISSAL
That, thank God, is one of the experiments at the ICC Champions Trophy. There is no reason why a batsman who is in his crease when there was an attempt to stump him or to run him out should be saved by the third umpire and the batsman who has been dismissed by a no ball is not.
Those who do not believe in the use of technology towards better decision-making should put themselves in Serena Williams' shoes just over a week ago at the US Open tennis championships.
After winning the first set of a quarter-final match against Jennifer Capriati, Williams lost the second set and after hitting a clear winner, after the person on the line had signalled the ball in, the umpire overruled the call and awarded the point to Capriati.
In tennis, the ball was not even close to the line, later, with Williams trailing 4-5 and fighting to stay in the match, she lost three points when her shots, called out, had, according to the television, touched the line, and in this day and age and with technology available, that should never have happened.
The use of technology to decide simply what was out and what was in would not have left Serena Williams shouting at the umpire and saying afterwards, "I am very annoyed and bitter. I feel cheated. I just feel robbed."
The use of technology can only be good for cricket, it should be used as much as possible, and definitely so for decisions involving a line.
