Re: 4th Test: Australia vs. India at Adelaide, Jan. 24-28, 2008
^Funguy, I am not talking of marginal decisions (where Hawkeye cannot be relied upon) , but those decisions which are outright wrong (where many times even by looking at a regular TV replay, you can tell that the LBW decision was CLEARLY WRONG).
My rough solution is the following (finer details can be sorted out) :
Give the batting & bowling team the option to challenge the Umpire's decision for a maximum of 3 times in a match.
So, example (1) : Symonds is given LBW by the Umpire but he feels that he nicked the ball to the pads....he would walk back to the pavillion and discuss the same with Ponting (his captain). Ponting will decide to challenge the decision by some gesture or some communication channel. (there would be a time limit within which a Captain can challenge the decision) . An announcement would be made in the stadium that Australia have decided to challenge the Umpire's decision and the decision has been referred to the THIRD UMPIRE.
The third Umpire can make one of the following three decisions :
(1) OUT (2) NOT OUT (will not count towards Australia's quota of 3 challenges) (3) REPLAYS/HAWKEYE INCONCLUSIVE (will not count towards Australia's quota of 3 challenges) - and field Umpire's decision would stand.
Similar thing would happen when the fielding Captain decides to challenge an Umpiring decision.
The third Umpire's role would be crucial in this whole system. He should make a decision only when "absolutely convinced" by the replays or Hawkeye (taking into account the margin of error in Hawkeyes). ---- else he should use the "Inconclusive" option.
Obviously, the above system is inspired by Professional Tennis.
Its the otherway round.....Hawk eye is being used in tennis after its succesful implementation in Cricket.