As Bangladesh and England grind out what has so far been a fairly dour Test match at Mirpur, questions have again been raised regarding the use – or in this case the lack thereof – of the umpire Decision Review System.
Since its introduction late last year, the DRS has not been far from controversy. England’s tour of South Africa provided one of the more memorable ones, when the third umpire Daryl Harper failed to give Proteas captain Graeme Smith out caught behind amid claims he didn’t have the volume turned up when watching the replay on his screen.
Now, Bangladesh are lamenting the absence of the technology in the current match against Alastair Cook’s side, where the Tigers found themselves without an avenue of review when line-ball decisions were made in the batsmen’s favour on potential dismissals of England’s Ian Bell, Matt Prior and Tim Bresnan. All went on to build decent totals after surviving their dismissal chances.
Throw into the mix an opinion voiced by Bangladesh coach Jamie Siddons’ on Sky Sports News that the umpires’ decisions tend to go against his side and the availability of the DRS becomes even more important.
“I don’t know why our appeals hold less weight than other teams, but it certainly seems that way,” Siddons said after day three of a Test where the result was up for grabs.
Siddons’ reactions to the decisions during play, where he gestured his dissent from the other side of the boundary line, has seen the Tigers coach fined 10% of his match fee for breaching the ICC Code of Conduct.
The DRS would eliminate any actual or perceived issue with Bangladesh appeals falling on deaf ears. So why isn’t the system in use for this series?
The ICC may have made the DRS available for use in any and all Test series, but there’s a catch. It’s the home cricket board and broadcaster who have to stump up the cash to use the system. That’s fine if you are the ECB and Sky Sports, or Cricket Australia and Channel Nine, but for a small and less wealthy nation such as Bangladesh money is an object.
Even the South African broadcaster during the Test series between England and South Africa in 2009/10 only used a limited range of the available technology and had the likes of snicko been among their armoury, there may not have been any controversy over the Graeme Smith decision.
It seems that a logical solution would be a reshuffle of how the cost of implementing the DRS in each series is apportioned. Bangladesh remains a developing cricket nation and surely there are ways and means to support them in implementing the technology for their home series, either with financial assistance from the ICC or perhaps by a shared funding arrangement between boards, and broadcasters – if the ICC remains intent on tying their technology to that available to the home broadcaster.
And what if, even if the board decides it’s worth splashing the cash – and after the Mirpur Test it’s hard to see the Bangladesh Cricket Board balking at doing so the next time a team tours – the home broadcaster decides they don’t want to, or cannot afford to shoulder the cost of implementing the DRS technology either in part? What then?
A meeting of the ICC Chief Executives' Committee earlier in March, which included a workshop on the DRS, discussed the use of the new system, with David Richardson, ICC general manager of cricket stating afterwards that the meeting looked at “the preferred technology, whether there was a need for standardisation for all Tests around the world and the cost of providing equipment at all Test matches”.
The answers seem pretty clear on all counts: use all the available technology, make sure it is available for all Test series so there’s a level playing field for all, and find a way to make sure cost doesn’t impact on the first two aspects of the system’s use.
Whether the implementation of the DRS in Bangladesh’s second Test of the series against England would have made a difference to the ultimate outcome is a matter for conjecture. Certainly if a couple of the tight decisions had gone Bangladesh’s way the complexion of the game might have changed.
The home side may have begun their second innings with a lead over England, rather than a 77-run deficit. What might that have done for their chances? Well, at stumps on day four the hosts are 172-6 with a slender 95 run lead and will need to dig in during day five if they are now to be in with a chance of drawing the Test.
It could have been different.
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