ICC Champions Trophy ( part 2 )

The ICC Champions Trophy is finished and after a very competitive tournament India has once again crowned as winners. The success of the tournament has prompted ICC to review it's decision of discontinuing the tournament in the future. This is the second part of a review on the performance of  teams in the ICC champions trophy. ( visit part 1 )

• South Africa 

South Africa reminded the world that they are still the "Chokers" at the big stage. However they performed without four of their main players. Steyn and Morkel are the one of the best opening bowlers pairs in the world. But SA had to play most of the matches without the service of these bowlers. Also they were without Kallis and Smith for the whole tournament. Probably the loss of Kallis who is a very good all-rounder ha affected the SA's team balance. Considering those facts the SA's performance can be categorized as satisfactory. However the way they lost their semi finals match was very humiliating.

• Sri Lanka

This time Sri Lanka were able to lose at the semi final stage without getting qualified for finals and losing the final. Most of the time I think Sri Lankan team lacked the balance in the team. They played with just 3 specialist bowlers and 2 or 3 batting all-rounders. Also Kusal Perera was a great failure. He was unable to get into double figures in any of the matches. It is interesting to see whether he will get more opportunities at the top. The senior trio of Mahela, Sangakkara and Dilshan took the responsibility of building the innings but failed in the semis. Malinga proved that he is still dangerous in the ODI format as well.

• England

With the home advantage England were favorites to win the tournament from the beginning. Yet their plans were hit by ball tampering accusations and the loss to Sri Lanka in the group stage. Yet they recovered well to reach the final. But as South Africa they choked under pressure at the final. Probably they now need to wait for some more time before adding a ICC ODI silverware to their cabinet. The way they lost the game in the last 3 overs was very surprising. Bopara has done a great work both with the bat and the ball.  Not so often we see the most performing player becoming the most criticized player. But with Trott it has been the case. He has performed extremely well in the tournament but been severely criticized for his slow batting.

• India

At the beginning there were many problems associated with India. Many people questioned the ability of the Indian batsmen to survive the bouncy pitches and the ability of Indian fast bowling resources. But this young Indian team has performed extremely well and able to win the final. Dhoni continues to be a successful captain winning all the available formats of ICC trophies. Ravindra Jadeja has become a real superhero in Indian cricket. A young Indian team once again proved the depth of the resources available in India.

• UDRS and Umpires

Apart from the teams another thing which caught the attention was the use of UDRS and umpiring. There
were several instances where the third umpire gave controversial decisions. The no ball call against Broad in the match against New Zealand was one such incident. Also the use of reviews in a match was very crucial. As an example in the SL vs NZ match both teams had use their reviews in the second innings. And if there were more reviews available the result may have been different. So in the latter parts of the tournament teams were very conservative about using their review early in the innings.

However with all these things the tournament was a grand success. ICC should consider themselves lucky to be able to play at-least a 20 over game in the final. With no reserve day for the final if there were some more rain the whole tournament would have been a waste of time. Yet we witnessed and enjoyed a competitive finale for a competitive tournament.

ICC Champions Trophy ( part 1)

The first round of the Champions Trophy is finished and now We are heading to the knock out stage. England have already qualified for the final and one of India or Sri Lanka will qualify from the next semi final. This is a review on the performance of some of the teams so far.

• Pakistan

With zero points from 3 matches Pakistan was the most disappointing team in the tournament. In the beginning very few believed that they were able to qualify for the semi finals and they lived according to majority's expectation. The only match they really gave a fight was the match with the WI and if their batsmen have scored some more runs they may had a chance to win. Altogether they need to find good batsmen who can score fluently in ODIs. Otherwise their future in cricketing world looks bleak despite the continuous supply of quality fast bowlers.

• Australia

Watching this Australian team play would be the most saddest thing in the world for a neutral cricket fan who have followed cricket for the past 15 years. The Australian team have lost their golden form which was with them for the past decade. For the first time they were unable to get in to the semi finals of an ICC event since 1990s. The batiing looks listless and bowling ordinary. They should find proper batsmen instead of filling their side with T20 superstars. One may argue that the T20 format has affected the Australians more than WI and India. With the performance shown by the current Australian team there is a serious doubt whether they can match England in the upcoming ashes tournament.

• West Indies

West Indies is the most unlucky team in the tournament. They would have easily register a win unless rain

interrupted just as Pollard got out. Even if there were no rain Sammy would be able to guide the chase easily. Yet rain god had other plans for WIs. They seems to be carrying their good form from T20s to the ODIs. Sunil Narine kept his reputation as a mystery spinner even in the International level. They need to find a stable batsmen in the middle order. Chanderpaul would have been ideal for such a role and Sarwan's did not get the 

• New Zealand

New Zealand is also one of the unlucky sides. Not only they came close to be selected for knock outs but also they had a chance to win the game against England if Steve Davies gave the benefit of the doubt of the no ball to the Kane Williamson in the latter parts of the chase. As always they performed better than most of the people's prediction. They have a very good bowling unit. But their batting carries few non performers. They should seriously think about the role of James Franklin in the team. He is not bowling much and not performing with the bat. 

IPL, Cricket, Politics and Money

IPL is rocked with controversies. There were many fears at the start of the initial IPL that the spirit of the game will be damaged due to the extensive amount of money being involved. In this season all those fears have been realized to be true. It was found out that not only players but also officials and owners of teams were involved in spot fixing and betting.

This will be a great black mark on the game of cricket. The most serious problem is the response of the BCCI towards these allegations. Although BCCI criticized RR players who were accused of spot fixing, they kept silent about the arrest of Gurunath Meiyappan who is the son in law of current BCCI president. Also BCCI tried to cover up the Gurunath's connection with CSK stating that he is only a enthusiastic fan. It's president should really answer these questions regarding the allegations.

The greatest threat to the cricket is not money but the BCCI. The arrogant manner the current president controls the board is apparent to the whole world. BCCI does not care about the ICC and other cricketing nations. This was evident in the BCCI stand against the UDRS. Only BCCI opposes UDRS and as a result it is not compulsory in cricket matches world wide. Also BCCI intervened to the removal of Tim May form the ICC panel and somehow managed to get that position to one of their own employee. Also the BCCI is beyond the control of Indian government. It have all the money and power to influence the ICC.

I would not be surprised if at the end of the day all the big betters, fixers and bookie owners were some how released due to intelligent cover up stories and due to political influences and some small scale fixers are sentenced for wrong doing. This was evident form the attempts to hide the facts about the connection between Gurunath and CSK. 

Anyway I think it's the right time to other cricketing nations to come forward and reduce the power of BCCI in the ICC. And also Indian government should try to regulate the actions of BCCI. Cricketing fans should use their voice against corruption in cricket and try to save the wonderful game of cricket from all evil. 

Snickometer

Invented in the mid-1990s by English computer scientist Alan Paskett, the Snickometer is used in a slow motion display to determine whether the ball did touch the bat , even slightly to determine if it was out. Although this was used earlier in UDRS, but unlike Hawk Eye and Hot Spot currently not used in UDRS. This is also known as the Snicko.

A Snickometer works on a simple principle. Filter the ambient noise, and amplify the relevant signal. The ball hitting the bat produces a sound of a particular frequency. The stump microphone will pick up the sound of the ball hitting the bat. It first filters this sound which is of a particular frequency from all the ambient noise. This can be achieved with the help of a resonance filter. At the receiver this sound is amplified and plotted to note the variation in the sound. A sharp variation denotes the bat hitting the ball and a flat peak means the bat has hit the pad or part of the body. This plot is viewed along with the replay of the shot to synchronize the movement of the ball and the spike in plot.  So in the situation where the batsman was ruled out, a review on TV with the Snicko will accurately determine the outcome.

Advantages and Disadvantages

The technology used for Snickometer is relatively simple. It only requires a slow motion camera and good microphone which are available in any international cricket match. Thus the cost of the Snickometer is very low making it affordable to any country. Sometimes Snickometer takes a considerable amount of time to give the output. This is due to the synchronization issues of the video and the audio. But with the development of the technology the synchronization will be done automatically and the results will be available as soon as the incident occurs. 

Also the Snickometer only indicates that a contact happened. This contact may be between bat and ball, pad and ball or the bat and pad. It is up to the umpire to take the final decision. Thus this leads to inconclusive replays in some cases. But in Hot Spot it clearly shows the area the contact occurred.

Being a very simple and cheap technology it is surprising that, it is no longer used in UDRS. It can be combined with Hot Spot technology to make better judgments about LBW and Catch decisions. Out of the three technologies used in UDRS, Snickometer is the least controversial technology yet it is not even used in UDRS. And the most controversial technology is Hawk Eye which is made mandatory. The Hot Spot technology lies in between and it is made optional in UDRS. Just like humans no technology is hundred percent accurate. So always we have to use the technology wisely and improve the accuracy of decision making process to make the game of cricket more fair to both teams.