By IANS,
Dunedin (New Zealand) : New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori and his West Indies counterpart Chris Gayle raised questions on the umpires referral system after the first drawn cricket Test at the University Oval here.
Gayle said he did not like the new referral scheme, which is on trial during the two-Test series. The system allows each team to appeal against umpiring decisions in the course of an innings until such time as they have three challenges rejected by the third umpire.
“To be honest I am not really a big fan of it. You have two standing umpires out there to actually get the job done, just like we (the players) have to get the job done sometimes,” Gayle was quoted as saying in The New Zealand Herald.
New Zealand captain Dan Vettori also has doubts about the system and believes the rules aren’t working in the way they were intended.
“A little bit of fine tuning needs to be done. I think the 50-50 ones slow the game down and you take the umpire completely out of it,” Vettori said. “If the umpire makes a decision and it’s not palpably wrong then you go with the umpire’s first decision.”
The West Indian captain feels that the decision making should be left in the hands of the two umpires on the field.
“Some of them (West Indies players) are a bit 50-50 on it as well. Everybody has got their opinion, but we’ll see what the outcome will be in the next couple of months,” Gayle added.
The Jamaican feels that involvement of technology in decision-making held little appeal for him. His cricket has always been played on the basis of accepting the rough decisions alongside the ones which fall your way.
“Sometimes they go in your favour, sometimes they don’t — and that’s been happening over the years.”
This is the second series where the referral system is on trial — after the Sri Lanka-India series in July. The system will also be used during Australia’s forthcoming series against South Africa starting Wednesday.