HOW MANY IS ENOUGH MR. SRINIVASAN?

Many many hearty congratulations Mr. Srinivasan on your selection to lead ICC from 2014. It’s an honour conferred earlier on the likes of Mr. Sharad Pawar. So it’s hard to imagine who, but you, could have been chosen for the post. The only other name that strikes my mind immediately is Shri. Suresh Kalamadi, once upon a time in Mumbai a staunch follower of Mr. Pawar. But I guess the only criterion where you scored over Shri Kalamadi is that he landed in jail and you did not. Otherwise activity-wise there is very little to choose between the two of you. But congratulations any way.

The purpose of writing to you today, however, has nothing to do with your activity. If it has anything to do with you, its about your inactivity, or rather your opposition. By your opposition, I don’t mean your opponents in BCCI. It needs no novice like me to talk on those issues. You are a seasoned player there. How else, otherwise, can anyone explain the stony silence about your acts from Mr. Arun Jaitley, a vociferous champion from the self-proclaimed custodian of morality in Indian politics. So that’s not the agenda today.

The agenda is somewhere else Mr. Srinivasan. Did you see the first test that finally India managed to lose to New Zealand today (Sunday 9^th Feb 2014)? It did appear for some time like they were on course to pull a near-miraculous win. However, finally they managed to keep their records clean. Since the ICC World Cup triumph, we are used to see these near-wins-turned defeats, almost wins, nearly-hit-targets, marginal losses, losses-for-failure-to-adjust-to-foreign-conditions all leading to clean sweeps. Our team (am I right? Or I ought to have said ‘your team’? The so called Indian team is at least 50% the Chennai Super Kings team, isn’t it?) won home matches against Windies and Australia, I know. But I also saw the smile and heard the sarcastic ‘good?’ by George Bailey on Ravi Shastri’s question on the pitch being good, when India chased down 350+ against his team. So your management of the game and the healthy promotion that it gets is known too well. But today I want to ask you about your opposition to the Decision Review System commonly referred to as the DRS. There’s something there, Mr. Srinivasan.

So let me come back to my question. Did you see the first test that finally India managed to lose to New Zealand today? It was well understood right through that the key to the result would be first session on Sunday. And in the first session, the boys showed application and character, without even a shadow of doubt. To give you an example, between 3.49 and 4.22 as per my watch, that means during as many as 33 minutes, our batsmen scored 8 runs consisting of a bye boundary and a straight drive by Shikhar Dhavan. Dhavan and Kohali, otherwise, had nothing to do with any ball that was not likely to hit the stumps. In fact a few balls were in line of the stumps but were going above them, so were left alone by the batsmen. The scoring picked up to an extent after the first hour only. Each of the top order batsmen was trying to dig-in and apply to the need of the hour. I am not any great admirer of our home-pitch-flourishing paper-tiger batsmen. But today, in spite of a stinging defeat, I could hardly find a fault in the batting line-up. This was a defeat in which I did not feel anger on the batsmen; I felt pity on them.

Do you know Mr. Srinivasan, that they lost the match to you? This is one loss where I am not feeling low for the team Mr. Srinivasan. I am feeling low for you and you only. Your adamant and self-styled rejection of the DRS was the single biggest cause of defeat, I felt. It wasted all the efforts and made a fool of the whole attempt. No, no Mr. Srinivasan. I am aware that in close games the result can go either way. A race can be won by virtue of the ears of the horse, I know. I am not thinking of the result today. I can see that with a DRS in place, some of the decisions that went against NZ may have been reversed too. The result may have remained the same all in all. But it would have been a fair result in the end. Do you understand a thing called 'fair-play' Mr. Srinivasan? Or is that the point of ignorance? Oh no; I had only traditional cricket in my mind while saying that. I didn't refer to being owner of a team and being organiser of the circus involving the same team. (I am told it needed change of rules at BCCI to enable you to own CSK.) It does make sense, if the game has a fair share of human limitations. However, when this share of limitations crosses a line, it starts making mockery of the spirit of game and gamesmanship. Precisely that’s what happened here Mr. Srinivasan.

In fact, in view of this position, I asked you- did you see the first test that India finally lost to New Zealand? Or is it too much to expect that? Even your national selectors don't watch all matches of India in full; where is the question of you watching them? But at least the last day’s play if not full match? On the fourth day, Murali Vijay was given out caught behind. Hot spot, however, showed the ball had hit his pad only and not the bat. For any doubts, the channel played snicometer also. It showed no sound when the ball moved past the bat. The sound came when it crossed the pads. It was absolutely obvious that he was not out. I couldn’t find fault with the umpire either. It was not possible to judge the distance of a couple of centimetres or the time gap of a fraction of a second for a normal human being. In any case, however, it did not matter for the result. India had lost its first wicket and the chase was difficult to that extent.

Sunday was, however, too much to digest. Ajinkya Rahane, the struggler for a permanent place in the squad was adjudged LBW when the replays showed a big inside edge. He was aghast, but could do little to make his point. Your rules provide no space for a player to express his resentment on any error on the part of the umpire.  Next was Shikhar Dhavan, who was again caught behind when the ball had hit his arm and not his bat. All the results would have gone in favour of the batsmen, had there been a DRS. Off course, I am not talking about the no ball that claimed the wicket of Dhoni. Everybody on the ground including the commentators could see the no ball except the TV umpire. I am not talking about that. DRS is meant to correct genuine errors, not deliberate blunders. But what about the other three decisions? A match that was lost by 40 runs, in spite of 4 wrong decisions in one single innings, would have definitely brought a different result, had even two of the four wrong decisions could have been averted. And I am totally doubtless in my mind that any TV umpire, even Billy Bouden, would have reversed Vijay and Rahane’s dismissals. That would have put the records properly; do you agree Mr. Srinivasan? Why are you opposing a DRS?

I understand very well Mr. Srinivasan that DRS has limitations? But can you show me a single item on the cricket field that doesn’t have it? Umpires also have them, so is the case of pitch technology and auctions of players in IPL. You must be remembering the players auction a couple of seasons ago when Chris Gayle was not sold. Which factor does not have limitations? In fact the limitations should make you advocate for a combination of innovations made by today’s technology. Slow motion replays, hot spots, snicometers, all have to be brought together to make as much accurate decision as possible. What is the problem in that if they all help you to reduce the errors and allow you to overcome your current limitations? Why stick to the outdated old systems when you have every reason to throw it out?

Some of your friends argue that in such a case, umpire on the ground will be a piece of redundant furniture. I agree. But why not? Let him have a limited role of counting overs, making players behave and conduct the game! Other decisions like wickets would come from the third umpire only. Why not? You agree that humans have limitations. What would be the proper way to deal with the situation? Closing our eyes, being blind to the facts and allow those ‘natural limitations’ to make or break somebody’s life? Or accept them with grace and humility and use all possible mechanisms to allow the limitations as little scope and space as possible? Which way do you choose to go?

Today the question came to me because the most obvious reason for India’s loss in the match, in my opinion, was the non-existent DRS. And the biggest and most vociferous opponent to DRS in the cricketing world is BCCI. We did not lose the match to New Zealand Mr. Srinivasan. We lost it to you, BCCI’s adamant and totally uncomprehendible opposition to DRS and your own self-styled sticking to the old defective methods Mr. Srinivasan. I don’t know if you are afraid that if a DRS system comes in place, the quality of BCCI’s top umpires will be recorded officially. All that I want you to reply cricket fans of India, Mr. Srinivasan is when will you change? Will you agree to a DRS only when we get at least a dozen wrong decisions in an innings? How many is enough Mr. Srinivasan, how many?