Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'DRS is the best thing that happened to Cricket' that was published in Newsband

DRS is the best thing that happened to Cricket

Decision Review System (DRS) was the best thing to be introduced in the world of cricket. India was one of th' first two countries to put it to trial. Every Indian cricket enthusiast is proud about this fact. But India became the only nation to refuse to use it in bilateral engagements. This did disappoint the fans but India had a reason for not accepting the system.

The DRS was a result of the Sydney Test of 2008, which witnessed consistently poor umpiring. Both the players and audiences were not happy with the kind of umpiring they witnessed in this particular test. This made Indian cricket authorities introduce DRS.

India and Sri Lanka were the first to use DRS in a three-Test series in 2008. But India found faults in the technology. While the rest of world cricket embraced the DRS, India held out for perfection. It was India which had come up with the idea of introducing DRS in cricket. The world liked the idea. But India was not happy with the system because of its imperfection.  

But later India softened its position. India agreed to try the DRS during the series against England. By this time DRS had undergone improvement and India liked it. Gradually the technology grew more sophisticated: the frame rates of the cameras improved manifold, a sound-based edge detection system, allied to slow-motion cameras got added.

An independent audit of the system was done by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Anil Kumble was involved in a lot of this. He played an instrumental role in making the cricket authorities of India and World accept DRS. Anil Kumble was an intelligent, open-minded man with a degree in engineering, Hence Kumble’s voice carried great weight. Arguments of Kumble were found correct by the cricket authorities. Since then DRS is become a common aspect of National and International cricket.  

This DRS needs even more refinement and greater standardization. Once a perfect system evolves, there will be least umpiring errors in cricket.  DRS shows promise of undergoing improvement with time and reaching perfection somewhere in the future.

The game of cricket is interesting because of Its glorious uncertainties. This is the factor which attracts millions of cricket lovers in India and World towards this game. Introduction of DRS will make the game still more interesting.