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The first day of the Boxing Day Test was as absorbing as it was a trip down memory lane, thanks to a patient knock from Australian debutant Ed Cowan and three umpiring decisions late in the day that would have been overturned had the DRS been in play.
Australia’s all too often batting collapses of late have been accompanied by calls to select batsman who put a high price on their wicket, and Ed Cowan is certainly in that mold.
Cowan is a limited batsman who struggles to score many runs off his pads, but he has a similar mindset to that of former Australian Test opener Geoff Marsh, whose son Shaun ironically fell for naught playing a lose shot outside off before he was set.
Against the new ball, Cowan, 29, left more than he played; scoring just 18 runs off 88 balls against new ball bowlers Ishant Sharma and Zaheer Khan, on his way to 68 off 177 balls.
In other times the crowd may have chanted boring or began to slow handclap, but such has been the public backlash to ‘get out’ shots, that at no stage did the 70,000 plus crowd heckle Cowan who batted well within his means on a good batting wicket against reasonable pace bowling.
In the end Cowan looked unlucky to be given out as did Michael Hussey whose run of outs continued with a first ball duck. Neither decision was a ‘howler’, though both decisions would have almost certainly been overturned by the third umpire had the DRS been available, later in the day the Australians were on the receiving end of some good fortune as an appeal for LBW against Brad Haddin was turned down.
Replays showed that Haddin was ‘plumb’, with the ball likely to go on and hit middle stump about half way up. The DRS isn’t without flaws but its absence does threaten to ruin what may be an epic series.
The ICC needs to overhaul the DRS and give the third umpire more power to do what they are trained and paid to do, and that is umpire.
The greatest issue with the DRS is LBW referrals, especially those that are deemed by ‘eagle-eye’ to be brushing the outside of the stumps or bails. The current reliance on ‘eagle-eye’ for LBW referrals is farcical, surely umpires good enough to make the international panel can be trusted to with the benefit of replays to make correct LBW decisions.
Boxing Day showed that there is still a place for Test cricket in the modern sports calendar, and its batsman who are prepared to leave, scrap and nudge their way through an innings.
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