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Use of DRS in knockouts alone is a classic case of eyewash, says senior BCCI official
A senior BCCI official has lashed out at the world's richest cricketing body for limited use of DRS in BCCI's premiere domestic tournament. Here is what he had to say
The BCCI has come under fire in the last domestic season for decline in the quality of umpiring in domestic matches. It has now decided to use DRS during the knockout stages of the India's premiere domestic tournament - "The Ranji Trophy". But the BCCI officials have called this as an attempt to sweep the mistakes committed by the umpires and that it is decision taken to keep the image of the world's richest cricketing body intact.
A senior BCCI official said, "We are not surprised in the least. This is how things are done these days, in an ad-hoc manner that focuses more on the perception than on substance. What is the intent here? Is the intent to ensure a mechanism to resolve bad decisions in the knockouts? What about the other 2010 odd games? Who is taking the ownership of bad umpiring in those games? Where is the effort to improve the standard of umpiring? Classic eyewash this is."
The GM of Cricket Operations Saba Karim, said that the idea to introduce the limited DRS is to avoid howlers which was the case during the previous season. He said, "Last year, in some of the knockout matches, there was some flak on umpires because there were some terrible howlers. So, we want to avoid all that and use whatever help we can get."
The BCCI official also wanted to know why an effort was not made to improve the quality of umpiring and conduct a free and fair exam for the umpires. "Questions are raised over the process of examination to recruit umpires. Why isn't that being looked into? A fair examination shouldn't be that big a problem. Then, there is an academy for umpires in Nagpur, who takes the responsibility of the functioning of that academy? And how many umpires do we have in the international panel? S Ravi was the last. So clearly, there is lack of ownership. After managing to scrape through domestic games, when they are handed duty during the Indian Premier League (IPL), they crumble under pressure. The idea to have Indian umpires in the IPL was to help them experience top-flight games and the pressure that comes with it. But here, they are getting exposed every second game as was seen in this year's matches. So, the same must also be happening in the domestic circuit. Just because it isn't televised, you don't see it," the official lashed out.
