By Tony Becca - On The Boundary THE ICC Champions Trophy is on in Sri Lanka, and but for West Indians who are still finding it difficult to believe that the West Indies lost to South Africa who needed 13 runs to win in the final over, up to yesterday when the home team defeated Holland, the interest has not been so much on who have won or who have lost.
For the first time in the history of the game, the third umpire is being used for leg before wicket decisions and apart from West Indians who are still talking about Mervyn Dillon's wayward over, that is what the fans have been focusing on.
To many, the increased use of the third umpire is good for the game - for the simple reason that the third umpire uses slow-motion television replays to view the action and that should guarantee less mistakes.
There are those, however, who do not believe that it will make any difference, and as far as they are concerned, that was underlined on Saturday during India's victory Zimbabwe when a batsman was ruled leg before wicket after the standing umpire had consulted the third umpire.
That, however, is because they do not understand the process and the role of the third umpire.
The process is simple.
The rule states, among other things, that for a batsman to be leg before wicket, the ball must not pitch outside the leg stump, it must not touch the bat, and when the standing umpire calls on the third umpire it is because he believes that the ball would have hit the wicket but is not sure where, in relation to the leg stump, it pitched or if it touched the bat.
His question to the third umpire, therefore, is not if the batsman is out. The questions are: did the ball pitch outside the leg stump, did it touch the bat, and if after looking at the television replays the third umpire rules that the ball did pitch outside the leg stump or it did touch the bat, the standing umpire rules not out.
The role of the third umpire is to answer questions - not to make decisions. It is the umpire on the field who decides if the ball would have hit the wicket and he is the one who decides when a batsman is leg before wicket or not.
There was also another debate over that leg before wicket decision on Saturday.
Apart from those who did not believe that the ball would have hit the wicket, according to some fans, a portion of the ball, delivered by left-arm pacer Zaheer Khan bowling over the wicket to the right-handed batsman, was outside the legstump and therefore the batsman, according to the law, should not have been ruled out.
As far as the third umpire was concerned, the ball, all of it, did pitch between wicket and wicket and many others who saw the replay believed it did.
What is important, however, is that the law says nothing about a "portion" of the ball.
The law talks about the ball, it uses the word "pitch", the ball is round, when it pitches, only a small part of it hits the pitch, and because of its size, it can hit the pitch in line with the legstump and a "portion" is outside the line.
What is important is the point of contact - where the ball pitches, where it hits the pitch.
