ICC does something good!

The decision from the much-awaited ICC playing committee's deliberations over playing conditions are out....and they've recommended in favour of the right-to-appeal umpire's decision. From what I understand, the batsman in question (against whom the field umpire's decision has been made) or the fielding captain has the right to 3 appeals. In case the appeal is successful, they would still maintain the right to 3 appeals....although the cricinfo report is vague on this, but this BBC report does clarify that its three *unsuccessful* appeals.

That is indeed the right move, as some of you suggested earlier in the comments, that an appeal upheld by third umpire basically means acceptance of a *mistake* of the on-field officials, and therefore the appealing party should be rewarded - in this case the reward being no deduction from the number of appeals. What do you think?


There were other suggestions also made by the committee related to the bats (Ponting's bat is illegal - if one looks at the summary), disbanding the use of artificial lights in tests, continuation of powerplays till atleast the world cup, and playing conditions for twenty20.

I'm really excited about the right to appeal ruling....and I guess that would be the feeling of fans all around the world - we don't want our precious time, often sneaked from other chores of the day, to be marred by vagaries of the *human element* of the game. The umpires would obviously disagree, as Venkat is doing here, but the heck with it. I can't wait for this rule to be extended to test matches!