Day 2 of the Ashes Test at Durham was a great advertisement against involving players in any way in umpiring decisions. Here’s a sample of actions by players on the field:
1. England captain Alistair Cook was apparently perplexed that a review for a caught-at-the-wicket dismissal by Chris Rogers was reversed even though the LBW procedure returned an “umpire’s call” verdict from the ball tracker. For a team that is supposedly keyed in to every last rule and plays “very hard and very, very fair” (a description which, to be true, requires an assumption of great competence as far as knowledge of the rules go), Cook sure knows how to play dumb. The idea dissent exists precisely for these kinds of questions. It makes it less forgivable, not more, that Cook’s questions were apparently prompted by ignorance. Had the ball track returned an “Out” verdict, then Tony Hill would have ruled Rogers Out LBW under the rules of DRS even though the original ruling was caught at the wicket. Read the rules, its written in black and white, without room for interpretation.
2. Towards the end of the day, there was an LBW appeal against Chris Rogers. The ball was delivered by Graeme Swann from round-the-wicket, it was very full and heading well past leg stump. Swann didn’t appeal. Neither did the wicketkeeper. First slip appealed, and silly point appealed even more than first slip! For an LBW appeal! That can’t possibly have had anything to do with the facts. The polite way to put it is that it was an appeal in hope.
3. Towards the end of the day Matthew Prior appealed for a stumping and acted as though he was absolutely sure it was Out. After the inevitable not out decision, he appeared nonplussed. He had seen the live action from 6 feet away! Rogers’ back shoe appeared to be grounded behind the batting crease when the bails came off. I understand that Rogers had batted all day. I understand that England desperately wanted him out.
These three examples lead to one undeniable point. They do so because the Day 2 at Durham was by no means exceptional, either to the Ashes, or to England. Every test Team, from South Africa to Zimbabwe, does things like this regularly. They do these things more when they are losing, and less when they are winning. It is undeniable that players do not care about the correct decision being made. Players have no interest whatsoever in anything other than gaining any benefit of doubt, however small it might be, and accepting any umpiring mistake which is to their advantage. As many players said recently, it is “frustrating” to players when decisions go against them, but they respect umpires and accept that they have a tough job when umpiring mistakes go in their favor.
All this is fine. But surely, it ought to be palpably obvious that this narrow self interest is an inefficient way of getting at correct decisions. Players are welcome to appeal all they want, and rub any part of their body they like after they glove a ball, but they should not be involved with decisions. They can’t keep having discussions with umpires about decisions after they have been made. The ICC can say that dissent has declined until its blue in the face, but this is mainly because the ICC has practically changed the definition of dissent, not because players have suddenly acquired respect for umpires. After all, dissent has nothing to do with the correctness of decisions, it has to do with respect for the umpire’s authority.
Players should have no say in umpiring decisions because (a) they have no new information a lot of the time, and more importantly (b) they have no systematic interest in correct decisions being made.
