Cricket’s governing body will test how long it takes to reach umpiring decisions with the help of television replays before deciding whether to expand use of the technology to cover a wider range of dismissals, a top official said on Wednesday.
The International Cricket Council will use the 12-nation Champions Trophy, beginning on Thursday in Sri Lanka, to experiment with using television replays to decide leg-before-wicket, bat-pad catches and caught-behind appeals by players.
Until now, television replays have been used by the third umpire only to decide run outs, stumpings and whether the ball had crossed the boundary.
”We all know that the technology can be a big help to the on-field umpires, but we’re not too sure about how much time it might take,” International Cricket Council’s chief executive Malcolm Speed told reporters.
Speed said the critical factor deciding whether to expand the use of technology will be ensuring continuity in the game’s flow.
”We don’t want a situation where the momentum of the game gets disrupted by technological aids taking a lot of time,” he said.
”If this works fine we’ll take it, or we’ll go back. It these decisions take a long time, it’ll certainly make us go back.”
On Tuesday, Australian captain Ricky Ponting said the excessive use of technology might take a lot of time to take decisions. In today’s one-day internationals a bowling side has to complete 50 overs in three and-a-half hours.
Cricket captains have said they are not sure whether umpires or the bowling team will be responsible if slow decisions delay completion of its allotted overs.
”It?s an interesting trial, but that doesn’t mean we’ve lost faith in the on-field umpires. We believe they get it right most of the time, at least on 90% appeals,” Speed said.
”The on-field umpires will have the liberty to refer any decisions to the third umpires. It’ll continue to be their choice which decisions they want to be seen by the third umpire, who has the assistance of modern technology.” – Sapa-AP