Earlier this season, media pundits were pondering over the low attendance for the Sri Lanka tests. There are some important lessons to learn from yesterday’s events – exceptional though the circumstances were – about what incentivises people to go to cricket.
– It was cheap. £20 entry and discounts for concessions. Lord’s tickets are generally £50-£90.
– It was a major occasion. England play too many test matches now, which dilutes the significance of each one. Less is more.
– It fell during the prime of summer, and during the school holidays – not May, when it’s too early for marquee cricket and fans don’t trust the weather.
ECB, please take note. And maybe the MCC will realise why the atmosphere was so good yesterday – the ground was full of real punters, cricket-lovers. Usually, Lord’s is far too corporate – dominated by stockbrokers and management consultants who are far more interested in gossip and champagne than the actual cricket. If only MCC would cut prices, and replace most of the debentures and boxes with seats for fans, and we might have scenes like yesterday’s more often.
Meanwhile, I may be the only England supporter who believes this series has been improved by the absence of reviews for LBW. We could easily not have won yesterday due to two failed appeals which Hawkeye later proved were out. On Twitter and in the commentary boxes, all hell broke loose. But neither decision was a howler – the kind UDRS was designed to prevent. They were in fact both pretty marginal calls.
We may not have got the wickets, but as spectators we enjoyed the heightened drama of the umpire’s decision remaining final. No anti-climax of TV replays and computer analysis. Out meant out, no reprieve. It may have been slightly less fair, but still made for a more satisfying spectacle.
Agreed on all points except one: Bowden’s decision not to dismiss Raina LBW on 63 was indeed a ‘howler’.
Pitched on the stumps, going on to hit middle, bat nowhere near (but he had to give *some* reason for not giving it plumb, obviously). UDRS would have corrected that mistake – but I’m being a little churlish; the rest of the match was umpired brilliantly, and there’s the nub of it.
Good stuff Maxie. Yes, a great day for cricket, and another fantastic performance from an England team which is worth so much more than the sum of its parts. All credit to Stuart Broad in particular for the way he bowled (finally learning to pitch it up) and for (just about) keeping his cool amid some poor umpiring.
On that point, I have to disagree with you on the DRS – it’s a disgrace that India have been able to bully us into not using Hawkeye. It’s far more important we get decisions right – with the technology now available, we can no longer hide behind “the umpire’s decision is final” if it’s clearly wrong. I suspect you may not have been as generous if a wrongly reprieved Tendulkar had got his hundred and India had saved the game.
I actually Tweeted the same point about DRS just after Tendulkar was reprieved – so I’m not being hypocritical!
As I said, I’m probably in a very small minority about the reviews, but what I’ve always argued is that cricket is a game, played by humans, and having a computer make the decisions seems so soul-less. The fall of a wicket is cricket’s key source of drama, and DRS replaces that drama with anti-climax.
How do you define howler? We were told that DRS was intended to prevent the kind of real balls-ups which embarrassed everyone, like when the ball pitches way outside leg, or there’s a huge inside edge. With the appeal to Raina, my memory is the ball pitched just on, so Bowden probably thought it was too close to pitching outside to give.
Remember that not even Hawkeye’s manufacturers claim 100& accuracy.
I thought Raina’s pitched on and was hitting the top of middle, so the immediate reaction was that he’d not given it on height, which was later refuted by his obvious mouthing of “bat” to an incredulous Broad.
So OK, perhaps ‘howler’ is a bit strong but it was a straightforward decision at that level, especially for a respected umpire like Billy B :)
It was middle of middle. “We’ve had trouble with you before Billy”.
You can see how this is going to evolve. Captains will have 2 referral opportunities, then 3, then……?
Hey, electronic umpires will be very, very accurate, you know?
Increasingly, you wonder whether umpires are even needed apart from controlling onfield discipline. Bowden had a terrible game with a number of poor decisions so I woulkd rather except the automated analysis of decisions even if it is not 100% accurate.