Cricket Evolution: How cricket embraced pioneering technology

Cricket and technology go hand-in-hand now and without the application of modern technology, a cricket match cannot be imagined. But that was not the case in the past and people couldn't even know what was going on at the ground until they received the newspaper the next morning. 1922 was the year when radio coverage of cricket matches started. And it took another 16 years for the first cricket match to be televised. 

Technology not only has played a massive role in making the game more popular and accessible but also helped the game itself improve. 

One of the most remarkable additions was the appointment of a third umpire or TV umpire to adjudicate run-outs. Earlier, only the two on-field umpires only had the authority to make decisions. In 1992, a TV umpire- Karl Lienberg- first used TV replays to make a run-out decision. Sachin Tendulkar was the first batter to be adjudged run-out by the third umpire. 

It was the same year when the stump camera was invented which helps the umpires make more accurate run-out and stumping decisions. 

The introduction of the speed gun in 1999 was a major technological advancement. This very technology detects the movement of the ball across the pitch which not only lets a bowler know his speed but also gives the opponents an idea at what pace a bowler generally bowls. 

1999 was also the year when the edge detector, better known as a snickometer, was first introduced. It is a sort of microphone that detects the sound of edges at a low wave frequency. Channel 4 was the first network to use that technology. 

Two years later, Hawk-eye was first used in a cricket match between England and Pakistan. Channel 4 was again the first network to use this. Hawk-eye, a system developed by Paul Hawkins, helps detect the trajectory of the ball in flight and therefore, it is used to see if leg-before decisions were correct or not among different functions.

Another technology to detect edges was introduced in 2006. The hotspot, as it is known, uses heat-motion sensors to visualise if there is any sign of edge or not. 

But all these technologies were incorporated when the Decision Review System (DRS) was first used in Tests in 2008. Before that, the batting or bowling side couldn't challenge any decision that would go against them. This was by far the most important invention that has been added to cricket. The technology was first used in ODIs in 2011 and in T20Is in 2017.

The DRS claims to have 90% accuracy. Now even the front-foot no-balls are called by the TV umpires which means the use of modern technologies has surely been helping the competitions be fairer.

There are some more technologies that are helping players and coaches by offering more in-depth analysis of the game. Ball spin RPM (Revolutions per minute), shot tracking, umpire cam are some of them and the number of technologies are increasing with time. And the time is not far off when more advanced technologies will replace the existing ones which will make the game of cricket more competitive.