Thursday, November 20, 2008

Where is the common sense?

India have won the 3rd ODI by D/L method. It's very sad that we did not have the full match. England was very unfortunate. They set a chaseable target for India and got wickets at regular intervals. They were set back by bad light.

The toss was delayed because of the haze and overcast conditions. And we lost 45 mins before the start of the play. Finally the match was reduced to 49 overs per team. When we have lost 45 mins and you expect bad light at the end of the day, 2-3 more overs should have been deducted per innings.

And adding to this the lunch break was not shortened. A 10-15 min lunch break would have been fine in this situtaion.

In a ODI match played between England and New Zealand at Edgbaston on 18th June 2008, England's time wasting tactics cost New Zealand the match. ICC changed the rule after this match to prevent such instances.

As per the rule, the 10 minute's break will be taken only if we lose more than an hour of play. We lost 45 minutes here and the bad light was expected at the end of the day. So, why wouldn't they implement this rule and reduce the lunch break to 10 minutes?

And why didn't they make use of the flood lights?

I strongly feel that D/L method should come into play only when any further play is not possible because of rain. In situations like bad light or anything other than rain, they must make use of the flood lights.

Suresh Menon at cricinfo says 'Have a full game at any cost'.

1 comment:

Soulberry said...

They did not make use of the lights because that wasn't part of pre-series agreement.

KP had the toss with him - he could have easily opted to field instead.