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Pre-dominance of incompetent English umpires on the ICC Elite Umpires Panel

Howe_zat

Audio File
Let's imagine NZ umpire Chris Gaffney calls a no-ball in the deciding Ashes test......but wait: Mitchell Starc had a huge part of his foot behind the line and Joe Root - clean bowled by the delivery & on 8 at the time - presses on for a glorious 324*.
In the next innings, Gaffney calls Jimmy Anderson for overstepping. And it is thereafter established that Anderson had a large part of his foot behind the line.
England win the test and the Ashes.
Gaffney is retained on the elite panel, and is appointed to Australia's next test series vs South Africa in Australia.

A likely scenario(?)
No he wouldn't. This is because the Ashes matters as a contest, unlike some piddling two test 'series' on the side of the world no one cares about. It's important to hold these small nations back, and so to do this as deliberately as possible we need to continue the secret conspiracy of umpiring mistakes against them, while also limiting their own influence on the imperial cricket council.

That's what you want to hear, right?

Someone already posted the Bowden video earlier, along with an explanation from umpires as to how this happens, so you clearly don't give a **** about facts getting in the way of your whining. May as well go the whole hog.
 

Gnske

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
One Kiwi is hardly a predominance though. And I don't think that in such a scenario Gaffney would be on the elite panel for very long. He would be 'gone by lunch-time'.
But that would mean 100% of elite Kiwi umpires are incompetent, that's pretty predominant tbh.
 

Day Man

School Boy/Girl Cricketer
Not at all. I would ask by what criteria 4 umpires from one nation came to be appointed, and what it would take for one of the English umpires to be removed from the elite panel. By and large Kettleborough and Gould are pretty good, from what I have seen.

How often have you seen an elite umpire in a test match call a no-ball that wasn't one? I have never seen that before, let alone twice in the same match. Is it therefore an issue of failing eyesight, or lost confidence - the umpiring 'yips' if you will. We always get the replay of the no-balls that are called, and I have never seen that before.

A clear mark on the bat is explained away as "that could have been made by anything", in defiance of all logic. The same elite umpire see's the wrong picture and inexplicably cannot tell instantly that it's the wrong picture - see's the ball being swept off the bat!! - and states "he's not out LBW then".

That's when the term 'inexcusable' gets applied.

Are you seeing other incidents of a similar magnitude from other umpires? I mean, incidents above and beyond the normal 'he's missed a clear edge' howler.
Let me get this clear. Was it actually your intention to preface your post with a clarification that you do not claim that the English umpires were more inept than their counterparts from other countries, and then to proceed to demonstrate with the rest of your post that you actually do make that claim?
 

TheJediBrah

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The batting team should get the non-striker to watch for no-balls and review if they think the call was wrong, one way or the other
 

Dan

Hall of Fame Member
The batting team should get the non-striker to watch for no-balls and review if they think the call was wrong, one way or the other
I've genuinely always done this (sans the reviewing bit, obviously). I didn't realise that other people don't...
 

NotMcKenzie

International Debutant
Reviewing aside, this would work best in club matches where the umpires are from your own side when batting. A quiet word, and they will then check for no-balls instead of lbws. Then the batsmen could get back to concentrating on their running.
 

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