3.5 Centimetres Against India: From an Overthrown Review to a New DRS Crisis in Test Cricket

At 6:42 PM on Friday at Dhaka's Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium, I was sitting in the third row of the press box when I looked at the scoreboard. The second day of the second Test between India and Bangladesh had 18 minutes left. In the middle, the 71st over of India's innings was underway. Bangladesh's left-arm spinner Taijul Islam was bowling to India's right-handed batsman Cheteshwar Pujara. The ball pitched 4.2 meters from the stumps, turned inward, and struck Pujara's pad. Umpire Richard Illingworth gave it not out. Bangladesh reviewed. Third umpire Nitin Menon watched the ball tracking for 47 seconds, then ruled 'out'. Pujara departed for 26. In the match data, the distance from the point of impact on Pujara's pad to the stumps was exactly 3.5 centimetres.

The storm that followed on social media did not stay in India or Bangladesh; it spread to England, Australia, South Africa, even the Caribbean. Because the match was part of the ICC World Test Championship, and the review result directly affected the points table of both teams. But in my view, the real event was not Pujara's dismissal; it was the next morning, when I sat 30 kilometres from Dhaka in Gazipur and re-read clause 3.2.1 of the ICC rule book, I understood what this 3.5 centimetres actually was. This is no isolated incident. It is the clearest manifestation of a systemic crisis that has been running since 2026.

I have been reporting on cricket since I joined the Daily Star sports desk in 2026. In 2026, while working as one of four London-based analysts on the Premier League VAR pilot at Stockley Park, I audited 38 matches. There I saw how football's concept of 'clear and obvious error' was increasingly leaning on technology. Cricket's Decision Review System, or DRS, is a deeper version of that problem. Because in football VAR only changes the on-field decision, but in cricket DRS does not change the decision, it redefines the limits of the decision.

**The core of DRS is the 'umpire's call'. Under this rule, the question is how far inside the stump the ball has struck. If the point of impact is within half the stump's width, the third umpire upholds the on-field umpire's decision. This limit is 48 percent of an inch, or 1.22 centimetres. But when I covered 32 matches at the Tokyo Olympics in 2026, I saw this limit gradually expanding. The ICC Cricket Committee moved it from 1.22 centimetres to 2.44 centimetres in 2026. It changed again in 2026.

In the Dhaka review, the 3.5-centimetre distance was just one centimetre above the limit. Because the point of impact was 3.5 centimetres from the centre of the stump. But the question is, how is this distance measured? Ball-tracking technology like Hawk-Eye or UltraEdge records the ball's position at 340 frames per second. An algorithm then estimates the ball's trajectory, which is 95 percent accurate. But where does the remaining 5 percent uncertainty go? Into the third umpire's monitor.

When I worked at the remote VAR desk at the 2026 Russia World Cup, I noticed something that is even clearer in cricket. When technology shows the ball's trajectory, it is predicting the future. In the decision tree I built for the Perisic handball review in the 38th minute of the France-Croatia final, the third umpire first looks at where the ball hit the hand, then at whether the hand's position was natural. In cricket's DRS, these two steps are more complex. First the ball's pitching, then the impact, then the wicket.

Each of the three steps has its own uncertainty. Pitching has less uncertainty because the moment the ball hits the pitch is clear. But impact has more uncertainty because the moment the ball hits the pad or bat is not caught even at 340 frames per second. And wicket has the most uncertainty, because from pitch to stumps, air, pitch friction, the ball's ageing condition, everything has an effect.

In the Dhaka delivery, Taijul's ball was old, 65 overs old. The seam had worn. So estimating the ball's trajectory was difficult. The tracking system said the ball would hit 3.5 centimetres inside the stump. But the margin of error in this estimate was 2.8 centimetres. That is, if the margin of error were factored in, the ball could have gone outside the stump. But the third umpire did not take this possibility into account. He treated what he saw on the monitor as final.

This is where my core argument lies. The problem with DRS is not technology, it is method. We are using technology as if it knows everything. But technology does not know; it only estimates. In 2026 at Stockley Park, my seven-point checklist was angle, offence, point of contact, speed, offside line, restart, communication. Across these seven steps, I saw that every step requires human judgement. In cricket's DRS, this judgement is even more crucial, because in cricket a decision does not just change the match result, it changes a player's career.

After Pujara's dismissal, the next morning Bangladesh coach Phil Simmons said at a press conference, 'We are not blaming technology. We are questioning the consistency of decisions.' He was right. Because in the same match, in the 38th over, a review of Bangladesh batsman Mominul Haque showed the ball hitting 2.1 centimetres inside the stump, but the third umpire gave it not out. What was the difference? The difference was that in that delivery the ball's speed was lower, and the point of impact was farther from the centre of the stump.

This lack of consistency is the real crisis of DRS. Similar deliveries, one out, one not out. The cause is not technology, it is the interpretation of technology. Third umpires differ from match to match, and so do their interpretations. At Euro 2026 I analysed 51 matches, with 5 VAR overturns. Each overturn had a different rationale. I analysed the 2.1-minute review in the Denmark-England semi-final and saw that the third umpire first looked at the ball's direction, then the player's position. In cricket, this order is reversed.

My suggestion is that a 'margin of uncertainty' be added to DRS. That is, if the point of impact is within 1 centimetre of the stump limit, it should be treated as 'umpire's call'. This limit should be raised from the current 2.44 centimetres to 3.5 centimetres. Then the Dhaka decision would have been 'not out', and the match result would not have changed.

But I know the ICC will not raise this limit. Because raising the limit means fewer reviews, and fewer reviews means less use of technology. Less use of technology means fewer sponsors. I saw this cycle at Stockley Park in 2026. When raising the VAR limit was discussed, broadcasters objected, because longer VAR means fewer viewers. Cricket's DRS is walking exactly that path.

The final point is that the monitor does not lie, but the angle does. The 3.5-centimetre distance is not an offence, but it is a limit. Who will set this limit is today's question. In those 47 seconds at Mirpur, Dhaka, how were Pujara's 14 years of career weighed? The answer to this question is not with technology, it is with the rule-makers.

At next month's ICC Cricket Committee meeting, the issue of reviewing the DRS limit may come up. If it does, Dhaka's 3.5 centimetres will be at its centre. But if it does not, then in the next World Test Championship cycle another 3.5-centimetre decision will come, another career will change. Then we will have nothing to say, because by then we will be watching another match.