Umpire’s call margin should be reduced – Mahela & Sanga

Mahela Jayawardene, a member of the International Cricket Council’s (ICC)’s cricket committee, has revealed that a recommendation had been made to reduce the margin of the umpire’s call on the Decision Review System, which could lead to more LBW decisions being overturned.

At the ICC meeting on June 4, cricket’s governing body had confirmed that recommendations were made to alter some aspects of the DRS, although they did not reveal what those suggestions were.

However, speaking to ESPNCricinfo after the first day’s play of the third Test between England and Sri Lanka, Jayawardene disclosed that the recommendation was to reduce the margin of the  ‘umpire’s call’ by half.

“We sat in the cricket committee last week and we decided that the 50% rule should be reduced to 25%, so that recommendation will probably go in and it’s something for the stakeholders and ICC to take up. Even the MCC rule book says if it hits any part of the wicket it should be given out, so you are going away from all that with the 50% rule.” Jayawardene said.

Sri Lanka lost one of their two challenges as a result of the failed review on Thursday, but Jayawardene is confident a change in the rules would relieve fielding captains of this issue.

He also added that it was unfair for teams to lose reviews, despite it being so close. Research has shown that up to 80 per cent of umpire’s calls that currently remain with the on-field decision would be given out under the adjusted protocols.

“That argument has been there for the last three or four years when captains are losing reviews so that is another reason the reduction came into play. If you take 25% out, I think the stats say that 75-80% of the umpire’s calls decisions would be given out. When umpires are considering benefit of the doubt I think 25% is okay, but 50% is too much.” He said.

The recommendations by the cricket committee will be discussed at the ICC’s annual conference in Edinburgh at the end of the month, as part of a wider debate around the implementation of DRS.

Even Kumar Sangakkara vented his frustration at the Umpire Decision Review System (UDRS) on twitter.