Please don’t shoot the messenger

“A ball that just misses the leg stump is not deemed to be negative bowling and should not be called wide when the batsman moves across to the off stump from his original stance. Had the batsman not moved towards the offside but remained in a normal guard position the ball would have struck him, thereby negating any wide call. “ 

                                    Cricket Ireland Guidance being applied in all domestic one day competitions.

Umpires are only the enforcers of the Laws and Regulations written and rewritten by others – nothing more.

The latest tinkering with the One Day Wide (the Profile Wide) has in my view been developed to address one particular situation and that is where the batsman deliberately moves (or even jumps) across to make a ball that could have hit him, into a wide. So why didn’t the regulation writers address that situation and propose, where the movement is solely to avoid contact with the ball and no shot is played, the ball down leg side should not be called wide.

But no, that would have been too easy. The previous regulation (“everything down leg”) had been transferred from the ICC into all forms of cricket here including women’s and youth regulations; it was clear and was not open to debate. What we have with this year’s regulations is the situation where the batsman’s initial stance (profile) dictates what should be called a wide by the umpire. As a bowler approaches to bowl, the umpires are now meant to remember the profile of the batsman along with everything else.  If it misses the remembered profile, it is a wide.

For the bowler, he or she gets into a rhythm and is bowling a consistent line to one batsman only to have the same ball to another batsman called a wide (as the batsman has a different initial stance or addresses the ball in a different manner). A ball 15inches wide of the leg stump is not called a wide as there has been minimal movement but one that is only three inches is called a wide. 

I accept in T20s, there is a problem with players like Glenn Maxwell moving across to open up the leg side; for him to miss the ball and get the bonus of a run and another ball is tough on a bowler. There is a game of batsmen moving and bowlers reacting to the batsman’s movement in T20s. I would hope that the extreme situations existing in this form of the game, do not dictate the regulations for the longer forms of the game and all our various competitions here.  One Day Wides used to be straight forward for umpires – now there are many shades of grey. To name but a few:

1. The classic leg glance off the hip down to fine leg using the pace of the ball has to be considered to be moving across as well as rotating; if the batsman misses, there is no wide.
2. The trigger movement of stepping over means that the wide down leg side for such batsmen allows the ball to pass three or four inches further away from the batsman without being called a wide.
3. Many batsmen have a natural inclination to move across and this means that the ball is further away down the leg side.
4. The marginal movement which negates a wide call when the ball passes well outside the leg stump.

But the biggest issue has to be the range of initial stances; in a recent match in one innings the umpires had to cope with one batsman who batted with his toes about three or four inches outside the leg stump while a lower order batsperson had their heels just outside the leg stump – there was therefore more than a twelve inch discrepancy for the umpires to cope with and to frustrate the bowler between the wide line being applied to each batsman.

The Profile Wide has been introduced to make sure the senior players play with the same regulations in all competitions but nobody is worried about consistency for the umpires. A constant issue for umpires is the number of different regulations written in different ways by different people. Bear in mind, some of our umpires might umpire in five different competitions in a week. As one of the stakeholders in the game of cricket, umpires should be considered in the writing and re-writing of regulations. Regulations should be straightforward and no more complicated than necessary. At the moment, we have regulations that set out the number of players inside the fielding circles in some competitions and outside in others. Why not stick to one or the other? Players often query “ four outside that means five inside” to which the umpire can only reply “four outside means four outside” because as soon as a player leaves the field, the maths change. In a Bowl Out, if the scores are level after the first five bowlers have bowled, one competition continues with the same five bowlers in the same order while another competition continues with the other players on the team. More consistency would help the umpires.

So next time you see an umpire with the regulations in his hand, it is not because he or she does not know the regulations but he or she is just making sure that the right regulations are being applied on that particular. In all likelihood, the day before and the day after for that umpire, the regulations are different; what is a wide on Saturday is not a wide on Sunday.

Reverting to the Profile Wide Regulation, whether the umpires agree with the regulations or not, they will enforce what has been written. So please don’t shoot the messengers as they are only doing their job.

Derek Dockrell