England v Sri Lanka, 3rd Test, Lords, 9-13 June, 2016

The no-ball(?) incident was an oddity - effectively to give the batsman the benefit of (what should be) doubt, so to speak.

Much talk on the radio commentary of how to solve such anomalies. Designate the 3rd umpire to adjudicate legal deliveries/n-balls. Make every possible dismissal subject to TV review (!).

And debate whether a batsman ever has time to change his shot on hearing a no-ball called - Vaughan's view FWIW being the bowler would need to be bowling at snail's pace (did he say 5 mph - stretching it a bit if so) before the bowler changed to a swipe.

And then the drawn-out Cook non-dismissal. Leading someone to say snicko, hotspot should be given to a further TV umpire, so 3rd could focus on tracking and speed up the over-protracted decision sessions.

Or you could just take the rough with the smooth and get on with it. In which case, England had two smooths in rapid succession today.

vilkrang wrote:Feel a bit sorry for Hales but he should have been out earlier, clean bowled only for it to be called a no ball by the umpire, then replays showed it was a fair delivery.

Other no balls weren't called by the same umpire. Seems chance as to whether they'll be called or not.

Yes, that was an issue during last summer here. Perhaps we need to have some sort of cyclops function to signal a no ball. Not sure if that is feasible.

So Hales dodged a bullet but still fell short of the ton. Oh well.

So the rain is gonna give Lanka its only non-defeat?

Looks like it.

Shame, was thinking of heading down but doesn't seem any point with the weather the way it is, very unlikely to see a result or even much play today.