AT the recently held meeting of ICC in South Africa, some important decisions were taken. Among the more burning issues that were addressed there, one was about the dissent shown by the players against umpiring judgments. Four stages of dissents were mentioned, each carrying harsher punishments than the previous one. But surprisingly, the ICC experts did not define what in their view, amounted to dissent. For example can a batsman, wrongly given out, look at the umpire? Can he also walk up to the umpire to explain the position and then return to the pavilion without any argument? And more importantly will these actions amount to dissent?
Recently Ridley Jacob of West Indies was wrongly given out LBW which changed the entire complexion of the match in favour of Pakistan. In another instance, during the final of the Asian Championship Inzamam was wrongly given out as the TV replays showed. AT the time Inzamam was just one short of a century. In one of the more recent encounters Pakistan got four quick wickets, all on no-balls. In the final test of the last Pakistan tour of the West Indies, Jimmy Adams and Courtney Walsh, the last pair on the wicket, were not given out. Although in case of Walsh the ball had hit the middle of the bat as seen by the entire stadium.
No TV replay was asked for, a decision which eventually cost Pakistan not only the match but also the series.
How does the ICC expect the players to react in such a situation? Are they robots without human feelings? Staring or walking over to the umpire is a natural spontaneous reaction of shock and disbelief which should not be taken as dissent. However if a player starts arguments with the umpire, it is definitely a dissent and must be dealt with.
The ICC has given the right of appeal against the decision of the match referees. Why shouldn’t the players be given a similar right of appeal against the judgment of umpires?
Such an appeal can be made to the referee who can use the TV replays to give his judgment.
Another decision of the ICC is that the umpires will now be able to consult with the third umpire on every decision. Consultations will be optional. However, the third umpire will intervene only when called upon by the field umpire.
This is not enough. Why would a field umpire consult the third umpire when he doesn’t have any doubt about his judgment, even though TV replays may show it to be wrong? In my opinion, in such cases, the match referee must intervene on his own. It must not be forgotten that now the cricket matches are played not just for fun, but a country’s prestige and the careers of the players is also involved. To eliminate incidents of dissent, resentment, anger and the players and teams suffering due to erroneous decisions by the field umpire, it would be better if the match referees are given wider and more positive, roles to play, instead of just supervising the toss, penalizing teams for less number of overs bowled and taking actions against the players on matters of indiscipline. They should be authorized to act on their own on all matters, including reversing the wrong judgments by the field umpires.
