2012 Cricket Headlines
Dhoni backs umpires over DRS
India in Australia 2011-12
India will not support the DRS until they are convinced that the technology is 100% perfect, captain MS Dhoni
has reiterated. Coming to Australia, India were under pressure to agree
to the use of the DRS, in part because Channel 9, the host
broadcasters, use some of the best technology available in their
production of home Tests. However, India did not budge, and Dhoni said
his experience in England, where there were several incidents that suggested Hot Spot was not completely accurate, played a part in making that call.
"I still put my money on the umpires because they have been doing the
job [for a long time]," Dhoni said. "It is just that the pressure on
them is growing with plenty of technology around. We feel the technology
is not 100% accurate. At times you see an edge on Hot Spot, sometimes
you don't see anything happening. Before the start of the England series
I was a big fan of Hot Spot. The way things went in England I don't
have the same kind of confidence. If it is not 100% I will still go with
the umpires. This is a game in which people commit mistakes. If the
bowler doesn't commit a mistake the batsman can't get runs. If the
batsman doesn't commit a mistake the bowler doesn't get a wicket. So
we'll make umpires too a part of it."
The DRS refused to die as a topic
of debate because in the Melbourne Test there were many potentially
match-turning decisions that could have been overturned had they been
reviewed. Michael Hussey would not have been dismissed for a golden duck
and Ed Cowan could, possibly, have continued batting in the first
innings. The decision to adjudge Cowan caught-behind is an interesting
grey zone with the DRS because there was a sound at the exact time the
ball went past the bat but Hot Spot did not show an edge. In the past
the umpires have acted just on the sound.
Ironically, It was India who could have had more decisions reversed than
Australia. They could have got Ricky Ponting out early in his second
innings, and they had Michael Hussey lbw twice and caught down the leg
side once. It is all a matter of conjecture, but India could actually
have won the match had they agreed to the use of the DRS, and used it
wisely. Dhoni, though, did not want to go down that route.
"What is important is that if a mistake is committed by the umpire, it
should not affect him," he said. "If as an umpire you give something out
when it's not-out, you don't need to go into your shell thinking you
have made a wrong decision. If the next ball the umpire feels it is out,
he should boldly give the decision.
"We are happy to go that way because it is a difficult job for the
umpires. We come back to our dressing-room after bowling and only two
batsmen go out to bat, but these are the people who stand there for five
days. Cricket has been in good shape for long enough with two people in
charge. They don't need to worry too much about what technology is
going around, about what will show on Hot Spot and what will show on
Snicko. We need to back their decisions. If mistakes are not committed
intentionally, I am perfectly fine with it."
Dhoni went on to take a dig at the numbers the ICC provides regarding
the number of correct decisions made by umpires. "You'll have to see
what exactly the ICC sees as correct decisions. Giving a boundary is a
correct decision; that also goes in favour of the umpires. You have to
categorically say this is what it is."
Dhoni's mistrust of technology would have grown when India appealed for
an lbw against Brad Haddin in the first innings and the ball-tracking
service failed to show a projection due to lighting issues. That was a
pretty adjacent call, but India wouldn't have enjoyed the benefit of the
DRS had it been in use. So even if the DRS was a part of this series we
would still have had as large, if not larger, a controversy on the
first day itself. Hussey would have survived, Cowan's fate would have
been decided subjectively by the third umpire, and Haddin would have
continued batting.
2011 review in cricket
The rise and rise of England to No1 Test team is the outstanding feature of a great year
Drving force: Ian Bell, who accumulated four hundreds and a double hundred in eight Tests during the year Photo: PA
Match of the year
There have been some thrilling Tests of late. The draw, with scores level
between India and the West Indies in Mumbai, and the nip-and-tuck contests Australia
had with South Africa and New Zealand, have made compulsive viewing.
But the best one, and there is a hint of sadism here, was the innings drubbing England
gave Australia at the Sydney Cricket Ground last January.
The
Ashes had already been retained in Melbourne but this was sweet
confirmation that an empire had fallen and that England, so often humiliated
there over the previous 20 years, had been emphatic in its fall.
Team of the year
Lancashire were contenders, after winning the County Championship outright for
the first time in 77 years, but England’s irresistible march under Andrew
Strauss and Andy Flower, to become the No 1 Test team in the world, was the
obvious winner.
Well drilled by Flower and his coaches and well led by Strauss, the team’s success flowed from having the best all-round bowling attack in world cricket, at least on pitches with carry.
The big challenge to their pre-eminence will come against South Africa at home his summer and India, away, later in the year.
Player of the year
From the cricket I have seen, the player of the year is between Ian Bell, Alastair Cook and James Anderson.
Bell made 950 runs from eight Tests in fine style and at a heady average of 118. That would normally trump Anderson’s 35 wickets emphatically, but Anderson, who has matured into the consummate bowler, had strong competition for the opposition's 20 wickets.
Bell, by contrast, still had the time to indulge himself (he made four hundreds and one double hundred) despite Cook (927 runs at 84 in 2011) and Jonathan Trott hogging the crease before him. Even so, he just shades it from Anderson.
2011 hero
Mahendra Singh Dhoni for the emphatic way in which he won the World Cup. Promoting himself up the order against Sri Lanka, Dhoni played a captain’s knock of 91, winning the match with a massive six into the Mumbai night sky.
2001 villains
It is impossible to look beyond the Pakistan Three – Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir – when seeking cricket’s worst villains. Caught out fixing small events in the Lord’s Test against England a year earlier, after an undercover operation by the News of the World exposed them bowling no-balls to order, their court case dominated headlines during October.
All three were handed custodial sentences, along with their agent Mazhar Majeed. As a deterrent, it will hopefully persuade future players to resist the temptations, but as justice it leaves a strange taste while the masterminds behind corruption in sport remain at large.
Memory I will cherish
Watching Andrew Strauss and his players sitting on the outfield at the SCG drinking beer and reflecting on a job well done after winning the Ashes in Australia for the first time in 24 years. An unbeatable combination of fellowship and achievement, with some cold fizz to remind them of who they’d just beaten.
Memory I want to forget
The deaths of Graham Dilley and Peter Roebuck, two former cricketers, and colleagues, who departed before the greatest game had reached its fifth day.
2011 in 10 words
England reach Test summit after Flower makes them hardy perennials.
Cricket’s New Year resolution should be...
Simply that, resolution. Too much cricket has led to garbled fixture lists and substandard cricket from exhausted players. Time someone sorted it and brought clarity and focus.
Well drilled by Flower and his coaches and well led by Strauss, the team’s success flowed from having the best all-round bowling attack in world cricket, at least on pitches with carry.
The big challenge to their pre-eminence will come against South Africa at home his summer and India, away, later in the year.
Player of the year
From the cricket I have seen, the player of the year is between Ian Bell, Alastair Cook and James Anderson.
Bell made 950 runs from eight Tests in fine style and at a heady average of 118. That would normally trump Anderson’s 35 wickets emphatically, but Anderson, who has matured into the consummate bowler, had strong competition for the opposition's 20 wickets.
Bell, by contrast, still had the time to indulge himself (he made four hundreds and one double hundred) despite Cook (927 runs at 84 in 2011) and Jonathan Trott hogging the crease before him. Even so, he just shades it from Anderson.
2011 hero
Mahendra Singh Dhoni for the emphatic way in which he won the World Cup. Promoting himself up the order against Sri Lanka, Dhoni played a captain’s knock of 91, winning the match with a massive six into the Mumbai night sky.
2001 villains
It is impossible to look beyond the Pakistan Three – Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir – when seeking cricket’s worst villains. Caught out fixing small events in the Lord’s Test against England a year earlier, after an undercover operation by the News of the World exposed them bowling no-balls to order, their court case dominated headlines during October.
All three were handed custodial sentences, along with their agent Mazhar Majeed. As a deterrent, it will hopefully persuade future players to resist the temptations, but as justice it leaves a strange taste while the masterminds behind corruption in sport remain at large.
Memory I will cherish
Watching Andrew Strauss and his players sitting on the outfield at the SCG drinking beer and reflecting on a job well done after winning the Ashes in Australia for the first time in 24 years. An unbeatable combination of fellowship and achievement, with some cold fizz to remind them of who they’d just beaten.
Memory I want to forget
The deaths of Graham Dilley and Peter Roebuck, two former cricketers, and colleagues, who departed before the greatest game had reached its fifth day.
2011 in 10 words
England reach Test summit after Flower makes them hardy perennials.
Cricket’s New Year resolution should be...
Simply that, resolution. Too much cricket has led to garbled fixture lists and substandard cricket from exhausted players. Time someone sorted it and brought clarity and focus.
