Boss of Hot Spot technology expresses doubt over third umpire decision on Pat Cummins dismissal

It was the spike on snicko that sealed the fate of Pat Cummins, but the lack of a little white mark has the founder of Hot Spot doubting that there was an edge at all. See the video below.

The caught behind call that sent Pat Cummins on his way at the MCG on Friday morning was likely an error, according to Hot Spot’s inventor and operator.

The Australian captain reviewed a decision from umpire Michael Gough who had deemed Cummins to have nicked a delivery from Pakistan seamer Aamer Jamal to gloveman Mohammad Rizwan.

Hot Spot technology did not show a mark on Cummins’ bat, however Snicko showed a spike slightly after the ball passed the bat.

Third umpire Richard Illingworth upheld Gough’s decision, sending Cummins packing to leave the Aussies 8-237.

Former international umpire Simon Taufel told Channel 7 that the discrepancy in timing between the spike and the ball passing Cummins’ bat could be attributed to “the calibration between sight and sound.”

The spike on snicko that sealed Pat Cummins fate. Picture: Supplied/Fox Sports

But Warren Brennan, whose company BBG Sports created and continues to provide the Hot Spot technology used for third umpire decisions in Australia, said that Cummins had probably been unlucky.

“I guess when you’ve got two different opinions, sometimes they can differ,” Brennan told this masthead.

“Hot Spot will give you one side of the story with one technology and Snicko will give you something else with the audio. Most of the time during a Test match they agree. But I think this is probably one of those ones that may have fallen through the cracks.

“Just going back historically, when we developed this stuff we were honest about Hot Spot and we said look sometimes it misses stuff. But when it does miss stuff, it’s generally on the fast ball when the batsman is taking a big swing. That wasn’t the case in this one. It was more of a forward sort of jab nowhere near (his) biggest swing. So I think, in my own opinion, I think he probably didn’t hit that one. I don’t think Hot Spot would have missed that one. But at the same time, there was definitely a noise out there somewhere and it was in the correct spot for Snicko.

“So I think what happens in these instances, ICC umpires are trained to, if the noise is in the correct spot that they normally see, then they’ll give it out.”

It’s understood a random boot scrape may explain the noise.

Taufel said that just because a ball looked to have passed the bat before a spike arose did not mean it hadn’t made contact

Pat Cummins is forced to leave after the third umpire call went against him. Picture: William WEST / AFP

“This has got to do with the calibration between sight and sound,” Taufel said.

“Sound does travel at different speed to light. Before each day’s play, the technology providers go out and calibrate the sounds particularly and so what we’re looking for is a spike as the ball goes past the bat or up to one frame past the bat which allows that distance between the noise and the stump microphone.”