David Leggat: Review system loses appeal

The DRS has brought the bowler roaring back into the equation. Photo / Getty Images

For generations bowlers grumbled, batsmen grinned - when the call was tight the verdict went the batsman's way.

The run-out, the lbw, the stumping, would go in the batsman's favour if the umpire had the slightest reservation. It wasn't a rule but it was supposed to be the convention.

Then came the Decision Review System, and life as cricket's batsmen have known it all their lives was turned on its head.

Where they were schooled on the value of a tight bat-pad defence, they now find that if the ball strikes the pad they break into a cold sweat. The DRS has brought the bowler roaring back into the equation.

Since 2008 when the DRS was introduced, the goalposts have moved with the ability of teams to seek referrals of what they deem unsatisfactory decisions. The system was brought in essentially as a method of righting glaring wrongs, removing the genuine howlers.

Instead it has almost become a ploy for the bowlers. Strike the pad, don't worry about beating the bat, and you're in business.

When Pakistan trounced England 3-0 in the United Arab Emirates this month, there were 43 lbw dismissals - 11 by offspinner Saeed Ajmal, eight apiece for left-arm slows Abdur Rehman and England's Monty Panesar. India have been against the DRS - primarily the predictive path technology and also Hot Spot - ever since they made a dog's breakfast of the first series in Sri Lanka and barely got an appeal right.

The International Cricket Council says the DRS cannot be used in a series unless both sides agree to it.

That has led to a hotch-potch situation where anything involving India is off limits, but fine with everyone else.

Sportspeople are fond of saying their biggest wish is consistency in decision-making, but there's no consistency in the use of the DRS, which is a nonsense.

Now, the ball-tracking technology used by Hawk Eye and Virtual Eye, the ICC's accredited systems, is to be re-examined at Cambridge University in May.

A company called Computer Vision Consulting Ltd is checking the levels of accuracy and reliability, and the results are expected to be with the ICC's cricket committee before its next meeting that same month.

What the DRS has shown is that before its introduction, and using the batsman's-benefit theory, many players have had second, or third innings after being given, er, the benefit. These days it's accepted that if a run-out looks close then the batsman will almost certainly be out.

But the idea that the DRS would simplify curly decisions is not borne out in one respect. It is essentially designed to back the umpire's verdict.

Two deliveries pitch in the same spot. One, appearing to be hitting less of the stumps, can be given out; the other, which might seem to be striking more, is not, based on the umpire's initial decision.

That is where batsmen are shaking their heads as they trudge back to the pavilion. Cricketers unhappy with umpiring decisions? Plus ca change.

The ICC's general manager of cricket, former South African wicketkeeper Dave Richardson, said having communications between the on-field and third umpires during a DRS discussion on TV is a long-term plan.

"Hopefully, when the umpires are so confident in the system and so well versed in using it, we will be able to do that. That's the aim," he said.

Just first make it work more effectively and less controversially. That would be a start.