Pakistan players asked by ICC to stop wearing smartwatches

You should never venture too far away from your TV when Pakistan are playing as there will always be something going on.

That was once again proved at Lords during the first test of the English summer when an inexperienced Pakistan team arrived at the Home of Cricket and dismantled England inside four days to win by nine wickets. Before the first ball was bowled, no one gave this Pakistan team a chance and in true Pakistan fashion, they put on a sensational performance.

Amid the phenomenal display that Pakistan put on with bat and ball, there was a quiet and friendly warning from the ICC Anti Corruption Unit with regards to the wearing of smartwatches on the field of play. Babar Azam and Asad Shafiq were seen wearing smartwatches on the first day of the test match, which prompted the ICC Anti-Corruption Unit to make a beeline for their dressing room at the end of the days play.

The ICC’s concerns

Over the past five years, the ICC-Anti Corruption Unit had been on the warpath to minimise the effect that match-fixing has on cricket. This specialised unit has been tasked with stamping it out and currently leaves no stone unturned in the pursuit of rooting out the dark side of the game. Back in 2010 three Pakistani players were found guilty of spot-fixing and were given lengthy jail terms because of it. Arrests and bans have doubled in recent years. There's seemingly no escaping the long arm of the ICC law. Even failing to report a case of match-fixing carries a minimum punishment of a ban for a player. 

In Pakistan’s case, the ICC took exception to the fact that players were wearing devices that could allow them to receive communication from outside the field of play. The ICC is very strict about that, with the rules stating that “communication devices are prohibited within the player and match officials area”. This is the case for very obvious reasons as any communication from outside of the ground could give a team an unfair advantage. For example, a simple text to a smartwatch could inform a team to send a decision upstairs after it had been given not out. The ICC hadn’t included smartwatches in the terminology of their official ruling and that’s why there was no punishment for the Pakistan players.

It was a grey area that needed addressing at some stage and it just so happened that Pakistan were the first nation to push the envelope. From the outside, this looks like a simple case of naivety rather than a case of sinister intentions, and the team have subsequently promised to ditch the watches going forward.

We live in a world where technology has changed almost everything we do in some way or another over the past years. Most of it is for the good but it is what we do with it that essentially makes it a positive or negative impact. Cricket is no different and over recent years the game has been affected by breakthroughs in technology have that changed the way the game is played.

How technology has changed cricket

In truth, technology has been changing cricket ever since the game has been played. The impact technology had on the game 100 years ago wasn’t as impressive as the sweeping and high tech changes we see today like Hawk-Eye, but they were happening. A simple innovation like putting covers on the wickets in the 1960’s changed the game forever. Before that, they were open to the elements and that’s where the term "sticky wicket" came from. It was certainly a bowlers game before then but like Pakistan did during the opening test at Lords, teams found a way to combat the changes - as Australia did against England at Melbourne in 1937 after the visitors were bowled out for 76. The Aussies sent their batsmen in reverse order to counter the effects of a sticky wicket, the two opening bowlers made ducks but Don Bradman came in at seven on a wicket that had dried out and made 270.

In recent times, though, how exactly has cricket been affected by technology? With Test cricket’s popularity plummeting over the years, the administrators were forced to try and capture the public's attention once again. They did this by introducing day-night test cricket which was only possible thanks to the pink ball that was developed. The first day/night test was played on the 27th of November 2015 at the Adelaide Oval where Australia won by 3 wickets against New Zealand. Since then, cricket has changed forever. The Pink Ball was the catalyst for this change, as it could be used at night with the players wearing white clothing. Pink balls weren't the only illumination creation that has changed the game in recent times, however. The rules of cricket state that a batsman is out if they are beyond their batting crease when the stumps are broken. Often these decisions are sent upstairs as it’s too close for an on-field umpire to decide whether a batsman has been run out or stumped. The introduction of LED bails has made the third umpire’s job a lot easier and has undoubtedly saved many a batsman from the dreaded out sign on the big screen. These revolutionary bails are made from composite plastic that are embedded with LED lights. Only when the stumps are broken do they illuminate, which gives officials all the insight they need when making a decision.

Of all the biggest changes to cricket in the last ten years, the second biggest has to be one that has brought the fans closer to the action. It's not just on the field where technology has come leaps and bounds but also off it, in terms of following and engaging with the sport. There's are options aplenty for fans when it comes to betting on their teams with most of it happening online these days as opposed to that of 10 years ago. This change in method has especially been taken to in Asia and Pakistan. It's true that wholesale changes have swept through every industry attached to cricket but none has had more of an effect than the Decision Review System or otherwise known as DRS. The technology that makes DRS possible is some of the most cutting-edge the world has seen. Ball-tracking technology, Hot Spot, and the infrared imaging system give complete clarity to the umpires when making decisions. Cricket is arguably a better game for it - and it evens adds a certain amount of excitement when a captain makes the T sign and sends a decision upstairs. Once he has the truth will always come out as the incident in question is put under the microscope and examined from every possible angle by the finest technology ever seen on a cricket field.  

For better or for worse?

When weighing up the impact that technology has had on cricket, one can only come away thinking that it has been for the best. The Pakistan players were asked not to wear smartwatches and there can't be any real complaints given that these watches can perform so many other tasks that are contrary to the spirit of the game. They weren't designed for professional cricket and given cricket's rather suspect history in terms of being influenced by outside forces, it's plainly obvious that we won't ever see any innovations like these being allowed on a cricket field - at least not by the players.

The official line from the Pakistan camp was that they were being used to track the distances the players ran over the course of the day. That is all good and well, but there are official GPS Unit's that players wear that carry out that exact purpose and have been given the green light by the ICC. At the end of the day, cricket has received a lot of new and exciting tech and gadgets that haven't only made it a much fairer game, but some of these innovations will give the future of cricket and tests, in particular, a fighting chance in the face of an uncertain future.