DRS: It should be the umpire's call

If we left it with the field umpire, the next batsman comes in BUT, if the third ump sees it is obviously wrong, the batsman can return at the fall of the next wicket. The problem is, how can the bowling side get fairness for a turned down decision? Maybe, after the over, they can be adjudged dismissed? That one might still be better than how it is. The other way is to reverse the sequence on every appeal. Ball tracking first. Hot spot second, no ball third and snicko last. Ball tracking first would save 15 minutes a day. WA's last innings had 7 LBWs with an ex-Vic leg spinner umpiring. 4 of them (WA's top order) were apparently howlers...according to John Townsend, the West Australian newspaper senior cricket writer. Two plumbs were then turned down in the Vics second innings (and Tremain twice in his first innings ton.) In 2017, we can do this properly if we actually want to.

They should do what they do in indoor cricket, and just have an umpire sitting in front of a TV screen. Get rid of on-field umpires entirely, and just have every decision effectively reviewed. You'd only need one umpire, and there'd be no howlers. Simple.

The number of reviews is meaningless if they are only used for howlers as every howler will be overturned and the reviews available will stay the same.

I disagree with "e) The interminable pause that follows a review is jarring." I find it adds to the theatre - you're either waiting with bated breath to see the outcome or already rolling around on the floor laughing because it's a Watto or Kohli blunder.

There's two problems to solve, really. 1) The overly limited number of reviews means howlers still happen and either can't be reviewed or just aren't reviewed. All it takes is a close early call where the review comes back negative and no-one wants to review unless they're absolutely sure, so the review is held back and then used when the last recognised batsman is hit on the pad in the 79th over and there's no point holding onto the review anyway. At LEAST 3 reviews each. Try to make up for the lost time by developing a better procedure for snicko than the interminable "rock and roll that please. Rock and roll that again please" etc etc etc If the number of reviews doesn't increase, at least give people back their review on umpire's call decisions. Reviewing, seeing ball tracking show 49% of the ball hitting the stump, but it's not out because umpire's call, AND you lose your review... that's the kind of thing that riles people, as are the Tests where one side seems to keep on getting the benefit of "umpire's call' reviews. 2) Speaking of that, "umpire's call". If we've gone to the trouble of a review, make the decision clean on the review. These "umpire's call' decisions are always what gives the whole thing a bad name. Build in some benefit of the doubt for the batsman if you need to, especially on what will be called 'in' or 'out' after ball tracking, but stop it with "umpire's call", it causes most of the contention with DRS.

But what if the umpire wastes his reviews on decisions that didn't need them, and then can't review one that the players believe is clearly wrong? No no no, Chris is right. The third umpire should be solely in charge of the review system. I do agree whole-heartedly (not just with a bit of my intestine) with your points (a)-(e) tho.

I disagree that DRS should be in the hands or the umpires. For that to happen, the umpires must either have unlimited reviews, or a set number per innings. To see exactly why unlimited reviews will never work, all we need to do is look at the way umpires currently refer run-outs. It is rare to see a run-out appeal not be sent upstairs, even when the batsmen is past his own stumps or completely out of the frame. It isn't difficult to imagine the endless torrent of reviews we'd have to sit through on a treacherous pitch, such as the one we saw in Bangalore. And limiting the umpire's referrals, as the article suggests, wouldn't prevent the howler, but only make them even more frustrating. Every decision the umpire makes involves some degree of uncertainty. At what point should a decision be sent upstairs? When the umpire is only 90% confident? 80%? There will inevitably come a time when an incorrect decision isn't reviewed - either because the umpire has used his reviews (responsibly or irresponsibly) or because he was simply confident enough in his original decision - and these will surely be even more difficult to accept. At least with the system as it currently is, a team only has itself to blame if out of reviews. The only change that should be made to the current system is that a team should not lose a review on 'incorrect' decisions which are upheld by 'umpire's call' (as we often see with fielding teams reviewing LBW decisions) or on reviews which turn out to be inconclusive (as in Kohli's second innings LBW dismissal). While poor decisions will always be made, that howlers go unchallenged will remain the fault of the suffering team, not the umpires, a far easier pill to swallow.

Completely agree with the premise of your article. The correctness of a decision should not become a tactic as it has. DRS should be in the hands of the umpires though I really doubt it's going to happen.

I don't quite understand why an umpire would review their own decision. If unsure, a referral to the third umpire is a different matter. The notion of taking the review away from batsman lower down the order, or a bowler later in the innings, places the onus back on the players to prevent whimsical review use... Shane Watson is a different case altogether ;)

I have always maintained (and posted several times on this site) that the issue with DRS is that it is operated at second hand by an umpire. Get a technician in there who can operate the stuff at about 3x the speed it currently is and have her or him review it quickly. It's not like there are any obscure rules that need to be known, any cricket fan knows how to review an LBW or edge. I agree with Chris, the no balls and dismissals should be constantly reviewed live. Have Traffic Lights set up and when the third umpire is reviewing and appeal or dismissal the amber light comes on so the batter knows not to cross the rope until it swaps to Red or Green.

Exactly. This is the biggest shortfall of the current scenario. One where it's really clear to everyone who's looking at the TV coverage that the umpire has made a shocker, but there aren't any reviews left so they just have to accept the wrong decision. This is where you need the third umpire to be able to just jump in and say, "sorry, you got that one wrong". So having more of a live constant reviewing happening by the third umpire would help lead to more correct decisions.

I think some sort of DRS is needed at international level. With TV networks having all these technology that can clearly show where Umpires have got it wrong, it just puts more and more pressure on the umpires. They need to find a way to utilize this technology to help get more correct decisions in a way that doesn't result in significantly impacting the game time. They could also speed up review time by not doing everything sequentially. For instance, there's no reason that the ball tracking can't happen while the third umpire is reviewing if there is an edge. It seems crazy when they spend ages trying to work out if there's an edge on an LBW appeal and then ball tracking shows it to pitch outside leg or be clearly missing the stumps. Surely they could just trigger ball tracking to happen straight away and not waste time checking the edge if ball tracking shows it not out anyway. Things like that/

What defines a howler? There are some points where a batsman can review a decision where they absolutely know it was wrong, like where they got given out LBW but they know they got a big edge on it. But in the majority of decisions the umpire is there in the best position to see if something is out. So if they've got it wrong how can anyone (other than the case stated above) ever be 100% certain that it's clearly a howler from what they've seen on the field? After replays we can see ones the umpires got clearly wrong, but the players on the field can only go off their single view of it often from not as good a position to see it as the umpire. I get the idea, but I don't see that it works. The idea of DRS is to get more correct decisions. This sort of move would simply go in the opposite direction of that.

Despite listing 5 reasons 'why' I'd suggest that you've missed the only way that an Ashoka can occur under DRS. This being when a side gets a howler and has no reviews left

I too agree that the DRS would be better placed entirely at the discretion of the 3rd umpire. One way you could do it is to have the old green light, red light system that the 3rd umpire used to use to signal not out/out decisions on run outs and so on. So after each appeal, either the green light is on to indicate that the 3rd umpire doesn't have a problem with the on-field decision or the red light comes on to indicate that he wants to review it. Or we could just get rid of the DRS altogether. To this day this remains my preferred option.

Have each team only get 1 review. This will dismiss the current 50/50 guessing taking place. Batsmen and bowlers should only be using DRS for the howler and not "disrespecting" the umps decisions.

Can't leave reviewing up to the on field umpires. Just look at run out's and stumpings. "Okay, so the batsman's back foot is past the stumps, but we should go for a review just in case." Umpires have shown that given the choice to go upstairs they will second guess themselves all the time and always want to go upstairs because they don't want to go ahead and make the call without calling on assistance only to be shown they missed something. I do think that there is a way they can pretty much do near-real-time details being sent to the third umpire who can basically make calls to interevene. Have Hawkeye automatically calculate and display the path for each ball to the third umpire asap after the ball is bowled and have them looking straight at close shots and instant replays and have the ability to call the batsman back before they get off the field. If something looks like it could be wrong but needs further review then they have someone on the boundary who stops the batsman until the review can be more looked into. This should be done with no balls every ball too. Have the third umpire watching a live feed of the side-on camera as the ball is bowled. If a ball is a no ball he calls it over the mic to the on-field umpire immediately. If it's too close to call live then it's not a no ball unless a wicket falls and they give it a closer double check. But don't leave it up to on field umpires to decide whether to ask the third umpire for help.