DRS technology coming to park cricket to save the weekend warriors from lbw howlers

Three friends who met at Harvard Cricket Club have invented an ingenious way to use ball-tracking technology at an amateur level.

Contributor

Wed, 27 Dec 2023, 12:01 am·3-min read

DRS, pictured here being used in park cricket. — DRS is being used in park cricket, not just at the elite level. Image: Supplied

How many park cricket arguments have started over dodgy lbw decisions given by amateur umpires who wouldn't know their leg stump from their off? If they're not giving the opposition out for deliveries missing by a mile, they're firing a teammate after somehow missing a big inside edge.

Well, lbw blow-ups may soon be a thing of the past thanks to a highly qualified team of cricket-mad tech heads in America. Seattle-based trio Vivek Jayaram (CEO), Arjun Verma (COO) and Brogan McPartland (CTO) met at Harvard Cricket Club while doing their undergraduate degrees in Computer Science at Harvard College.

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They founded Fulltrack A1 in 2021, offering cricketers around the world an affordable training program to ball track from one click of their phone, perched on a camera behind the bowler. Fulltrack A1 detects speed, swing, spin, pitchmaps, beehives and release points and is being used as a training tool by first-class teams in Australia and the UK.

And one of the spin-offs benefits is an opportunity for grassroots teams to use the device to monitor lbw decisions. Umpires wearing an iPhone in a pocket on their chests trialled the program in a recreational Sunday league game played in New Delhi earlier this month and hailed it a great success.

Vivek Jayaram, Arjun Verma and Brogan McPartland, pictured here at a cricket game. — Vivek Jayaram, Arjun Verma and Brogan McPartland. Image: Supplied

"Over the last year, our R&D (research and development) team has managed to build stabilisation algorithms that enable the same advanced technology by placing the phone in a pocket in the middle of the umpire's chest," McPartland told Yahoo Sport Australia. "We've been testing with umpires and iterating on the logistics for a while now and they are incredibly happy with the ease of use.

"We run DRS deliveries on computationally intensive servers that enable additional accuracy that is crucial for this purpose. The only time the phone needs to be handled is when there is a review. The umpire pulls out the phone from the pocket, clicks DRS button, waits 90 seconds and the result, with the graphic, is ready. The number of reviews will be up to the league/organiser and dependent on the length of game."

The players, pictured here after the first successful overturned decision in park cricket. — The reaction from the players after the first successful overturned decision in park cricket. Image: Supplied

DRS technology that could change park cricket for good

As for the players' reaction, McPartland said with a laugh: "Their reactions, of course, were driven by the outcome. (During the New Delhi trial) the fielding team was ecstatic on overturning an umpire's decision while the batter, who was chirped by his teammates at becoming the first ever victim of grassroots cricket DRS, was excited by the prospect of using the technology to his benefit in the future."

There is now hope the system could be implemented at lower-level cricket once an affordable price point can be achieved. It would certainly ease tension and drama over those lbw howlers.

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