By Anil - 11 July '03
August 4 2003

The LBW law, widely considered the Achilles heel of cricket due to the contradictory and overly complex specification of the law needs to be overhauled immediately. A number of complaints have been filed to the ICC by member boards regarding the inconsistency by ICC umpires and referees based on which team they are ruling on.

The most recent submission to the ICC asks for monitoring the performance of the umpires on the "elite panel" after every series. This follows an earlier complaint after Australia's McGrath was let off scot-free after unacceptable abuse of Ramnaresh Sarwan of the West Indies in their recent series. At the ICC meeting, this complaint was discussed and Malcolm Gray admitted to inconsistencies and differences in the way that officials have performed in different matches.

The ICC has recently been more open in admitting referee inconsistency, even though they have shown no inclination to solve the problem. If one looks at the makeup of the "elite umpire panel", and consider that makeup in the context of some remarks made by outgoing ICC president Malcom Gray last month, the writing is on the wall.

It has long been recognized by players that one must cultivate an umpire's good graces if one expects good decisions from him. But with the current homogenous makeup of the panel, umpires will tend to "relate" better to one of the teams. This may mean any of the following:

• Pre-conceived notions of which team appeals "honestly"
• Who can the umpire share a joke with
• Whether a particular cricketer should be "punished" with a harsh decision for some previous action that the umpire may have disapproved of (such as a raucous appeal)
• A team member that an umpire does not "like" (for whatever reason).

The situation is considerably degraded by the fact that umpires have been armed with a weapon that they feel free to use subjectively at their discretion: the LBW law.

The LBW law is perhaps the worst conceived in any international sport. It is incredibly complex to apply in real time, especially for a 50+ man with failing eyesight and hearing (a good description of most ICC umpires). Umpires appear unsure of whether to declare a batsman out or not 50% or more of the time, often even worse. But what makes a true mockery of the law is that umpires have been found to deliberately manipulate their decision based on subjective factors. They will not shy away from using it as a tool to enforce discipline, with commentators sometimes making comments like "the umpire seems to be having fun with Kumble". To judge an LBW, the umpires have to check among other things:

• Where the ball pitched
• Height of the ball when it struck the batsman's pads
• Whether the batsman was playing a shot
• Which way the ball was swinging/spinning/moving
• How far the bowler was from the stumps when he bowled the delivery
• Whether the ball took the slightest of edges before it hit the pads

Strangely, it doesn't matter if the ball took an edge if the batsman was bowled. Curiously, an LBW is allowed when the ball pitched outside the off stump, but not outside the leg stump. Interestingly, there is no visual aid for the elderly umpire to decide where the ball pitched.

The end result is that if the batsman is ever struck on the pad, there is absolutely no telling how the umpire will deal with an appeal. His excuse will be that it's difficult to call it correctly (which it often is). Certain teams have been able to pressure the umpires consistently into giving poor decisions in their favor with aggressive appealing, whereas other teams who appeal in the same manner have been punished either with off-field penalties (bans and fines), or with even plumb LBW's turned down. Often, the umpires have been able to decide the course of a match based solely on LBW's: by denying good ones, or granting poor ones. This is especially the case when teams are evenly matched. But the umpires have been able to shake off criticism with excuses such as: we're only human; we have the best view; it all evens out in the end; etc.