ICC reveals Anil Kumble’s support behind the implementation of DRS in India

Geoff Allardice, the ICC General Manager of Cricketing affairs has revealed incumbent Indian coach Anil Kumble was instrumental in ensuring that the BCCI did indeed implement the DRS system for their upcoming series against England. For some time, the BCCI had pushed the envelope on the DRS stating that they would only use the technology unless it was 100 percent perfect.

Allardice revealed that Kumble had been on a trip to MIT when he was the chairman of the ICC’s cricket committee. He had seen the engineers at the university work on the technology and subsequently was supportive of the project.

“But he (Kumble) has been very supportive of the project. He was also in the pre-committee meeting in May last year when the results when the majority of the tests were presented. He was aware of the pre committee’s position, which was that they wanted a more consistent use of technology across international matches,” Allardice stated.

“The fact that he was subsequently appointed as Indian coach; he obviously has that background going into his coaching position. He’s been very instrumental in the process that we’ve taken for the assessment of technology and the approval process and new technologies and things like that; he’s taken a methodical approach,” Allardice elaborated how much Kumble contributed in the process.

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“I think it was an opportunity to talk to the BCCI about what some of those developments have been, and about how some of those developments have probably appeased some of the concerns they have had around performance of the technologies, particularly in the area of ball tracking.

Allardice also noted a few developments in the software that is in use at the moment. “The two of note which you will have seen are the increased frame rate of the cameras, obviously puts more information into each calculation of a predicted path and produces a more accurate result, and the location of the point of impact now has the ultra edge or the sound based system helping them getting the right frame of impact.

“They are two improvements in the last couple of years that have certainly improved the performance of ball tracking since the BCCI originally took its position a few years ago,” he said.

“I think when I say “more consistent use of technology,” I think having the same type of technology at each match; not the same provider at each match. Because one of the things about technology is that there’s always development going into it, and the more people you’ve got involved, the more ideas that get advanced.”

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