By Qaiser Mohammad Ali, IANS
Mumbai : Cricket umpiring in India is set to undergo a sea change as the Indian board has finally decided to embrace modern technology, appoint coaches for umpires and take professional assistance from its Australian counterpart.
With an increased match fee, thorough assessment of their decisions, recording of all senior level tournaments, especially for the umpires, the cricketing officials are expected to improve their standard in the ongoing 2007-08 season that started with the Irani Trophy this month.
In an effort to make umpiring decisions more accurate, the Board of Control for Cricket India (BCCI) has appointed 13 coaches, comprising senior or retired umpires, to impart knowledge to the current lot. Former Test umpire B.A. Jamula is heading the panel of coaches.
“The umpires’ coaches had a workshop here Sunday and Monday conducted by Australia’s Simon Taufel, a member of the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) Elite Panel of Umpires. The stress at the workshop was on how best to assess umpires’ decisions,” Jamula told IANS.
“Among the changes proposed to improve umpiring standards is doing away with the captains’ report in domestic tournaments. So far, we have been relying heavily on captains’ reports on umpires,” Jamula disclosed during the India-Australia one-day international here Wednesday.
It has often been seen that captains and umpires gave negative marks to each other, leading to bad blood and acrimony.
Jamula said all elite and plate division matches of the Ranji Trophy and other senior tournaments would be recorded from this season and umpires would be given CDs of recorded visuals of the decisions they had made during matches.
One coach who will be present at each senior tournament and his assessment will then be discussed threadbare and discussed with the on-field umpires.
“For this, the umpires and the umpires’ coach will stay back at that venue for a day after the match,” said the Mumbai-based umpire.
Eight cameras will record each match to help umpires assess their performance. A professional company in Chennai has been hired to burn the action on CDs and give its copies to on-field umpires and the BCCI.
“The technical people from this company will tag all the decisions made by the umpires and a comprehensive report will be prepared at the end of a match. This will help in analysing and assessing the officials’ performances accurately,” said Jamula.
All this will be done using analysis matrix, borrowed from the Australian cricket board, on whose basis the umpires’ performances will be judged.
Jamula pointed out that Indian umpires would have to embrace technology to get maximum benefit of this programme.
“If seriously implemented, this move will surely help improve the umpiring standard,” he said.