Flashback: The first batsman to be given out by Decision Review System
India’s Virender Sehwag has had an interesting association with the Umpire Decision Review System (DRS). This is because Sehwag was the first cricketer to be given out through DRS in international cricket. 11 years ago, on 23 July 2008 in the first Test match between India and Sri Lanka in Colombo, DRS was implemented as a trial. Through this system, Sehwag became the first batsman in the world to be given out by the third umpire. However, his decision was controversial and fingers were pointed at it.
In that particular instance, the ball hit Sehwag’s pads which were bowled round the stumps by Sri Lankan spinner Muttiah Muralitharan. The ball, which hit the inside of Sehwag’s front pads, hit the back pad after hitting the leg-stump line. The back pads must have been in line with the middle stump. Umpire Mark Benson turned down the LBW appeal, on which the Sri Lankan team took a review. During DRS, the virtual eye (Ball Tracking Device) failed to detect the change after hitting the front pads. Instead, it was shown that the ball was going to hit the middle stump and since Sehwag had not played the shot, Benson was forced to reverse his decision.
The technique was used to assist the umpire but, in this case, the technique failed to help and third umpire Rudy Koertzen also ignored this during the discussion with the on-field umpire. It was decided only that the ball would have hit the middle stump. It was completely ignored that the ball hit the front pad and changed direction and hit the back pad. Had this been taken into account, the decision would have been in favour of the batsman and he would have been declared not out.
There were many controversial decisions that were seen during the whole series. In fact, many of the decisions did not go in favour of India, making the team furious. After this series, BCCI decided to not use DRS in many of the future series and was reluctant for its implementation. The DRS was finally accepted by the BCCI during India’s tour of England in 2016. The review system was also used during the India-England series in 2011 apart from the 2008 tour to Sri Lanka.
