 The Decision Review System has been made mandatory by the ICC after it
broke down the resistance to the system by the BCCI. However, it has been announced
that the DRS will be used in a changed format.
According to the new format of the DRS, there will be no mandatory use of the
Hawk-Eye or any other predictive technology. While the use of DRS will be mandatory,
it will use only Hot-Spot and Snick-o-Meter as the two technologies which will
be mandatory to use. The others will be an add-on if the boards agree to it.
This will mean that the stand that the BCCI had taken on the use of DRS was whittled
apart. They had often said that the DRS wasn't foolproof in connection with the
predictive technology, which means that the ICC had had to change things around
and make it non-compulsory. However, the other stand that was taken by the BCCI
on the issue was that while Hot-Spot was perfect, it was too costly to implement.
This was cut to shreds after even the relatively poorer boards like the Pakistani
and the West Indian boards accepted the use of Hot-Spot.
Only two days ago, the BCCI vice-president Niranjan Shah had said that
the use of Hot-Spot was too costly and needed the boards to shell out $60,000
per Test match. However that was a wrongly quoted figure, with the costs associated
with the Hot-Spot being $5000 per day.
This will now mean that the DRS can now be used to decide on caught-behind decisions
and inside-edges for lbws, but it cannot be used to determine whether the ball
would go on to hit the stumps in case of lbw. This is because the former can be
adjudicated using the Hot-Spot and the Snick-o-Meter whereas the latter needs
a predictive technology that will not be used for the purpose.
In allowing the boards to decide whether the Hawk-Eye will be used, the ICC has
also kept an option open in case the Hawk-Eye can be improved much further to
get accurate readings.
Earlier, not only the BCCI but also the India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni
and the master batsman, Sachin Tendulkar had opposed the use of DRS.
Later, Tendulkar clarified that he was referring to the predictive technology
but said that he had faith in the Hot-Spot. The BCCI seems to have heard what
he has had to say it seems!
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