Sachin - Thrice Unlucky
To err is human, to err twice is dumb human and to err thrice is Sri Lankan Umpires. Although Australians earned a lot of infamy for the notorious vendetta against Sachin, the Sri Lankans have outdone them by giving three dubious Leg Before Wicket decisions against Sachin in a row. Still, there is not much hue and cry in the media for the simple fact that India has gone on to win the matches. That shouldn't, however, be used as an excuse for overlooking the goof-up on the umpire's part. The umpires in question are Dharmasena, who incidentally was on his debut as an umpire for an International fixture and his decision of giving Sachin out was his very first, and Gamini Silva.
Dharmasena should be forgiven, as it was actually the fault of Sri Lankan Cricket Board to make him officiate such a high profile game on his debut. In fact, there were many senior umpires who were superseded by Dharmasena just because he has played as a cricketer for Sri Lanka and was a part of the 1996 world cup winning squad. And since when have good cricketers made good umpires? You need completely different set of skills for playing and for umpiring.
Coming back to the senior umpires, who have had their share of making bad decisions, it is actually owing to the technology that their mistakes become so apparent. They don't have the aids such as the pitch marker, replays from different angles, or the hawk eye to assist them in taking the decision, which we - the audience, have. They have to make their decision in a matter of seconds, and hence should not be expected to be perfect. But since it is in their job profile to make such decisions, they should get it right more often than not, if not always.
Taking a cue from Tennis, the system of referral has been experimented with, with mixed results. So, now ICC has fiddled with the system and is introducing it again, on a trial basis, with two referrals per team allowed. Depending on the feedback after the trial period, ICC will decide whether or not to make it a permanent feature of Cricket.
Whether it is the man or machine that takes or assists in making the correct decisions is quite unimportant, as long as Sachin, or any other cricketer for that matter, doesn't have to make that long walk back to the pavilion due to a bad decision. Still, even if someone is so unfortunate to be at the receiving end of such a goof-up, they should learn from Sachin to take it gracefully.
Ashwin Mehendale
[ratings]
[image courtesy: http://tinyurl.com/c2cwm4]
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