After the 2019 edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) was marred by poor umpiring calls, the IPL Governing Council discussed having an extra umpire in place just to handle no-ball calls.
According to Sportstar, the concept will be tried out in other tournaments before it is implemented in the IPL and it is being done to reduce errors. “There will be a specialised umpire for this, who will work in co-ordination with the on-field umpires and the third umpire. This is an effort to reduce the errors,” a member of the IPL Governing Council told Sportstar. “It can be tried out in any tournaments, even in Ranji Trophy. We will discuss it further and see how it goes,” the member further added.
The Indian Premier League Governing Council met at the BCCI HQ on Tuesday and as expected, the biggest topic of discussion was the introduction of the concept of 'Power Player'. Since there was no conclusion to the debate, the matter is set to be discussed further as per those present in the meeting that was chaired by Chairman Brijesh Patel.
The agency had reported on Monday that the IPL GC would discuss the concept of 'Power Play'. As per the plan, teams would be allowed to substitute a player at the fall of a wicket or at the end of an over at any point in the game. The idea has the capacity to change match situations and induce out-of-the-box thinking and strategising from the two teams and engage the fans further.
“We are exploring all the options and decision will be taken over the course of time. The idea is to make the tournament fan-friendly, and we will take every suggestion into consideration. But Power Player may not be used in the next edition of the IPL due to lack of time. Before we implement that in the IPL, we need to test that in domestic tournaments and that will take some time,” the official told Sportstar.
