Ashes 2025-26: Controversy as England’s Jamie Smith is given out on review in Perth

The Perth Stadium was filled with English boos as Smith left the field.

The relevant section of the International Cricket Council’s playing conditions, which implement the structures for Test cricket’s review system, is as follows:

“If despite the available technology, the third umpire is unable to decide with a high degree of confidence whether the original on-field decision should be changed, then he/she shall report that the replays are ‘inconclusive’, and that the on-field decision shall stand. The third umpire shall not give answers conveying likelihoods or probabilities.”

Sharfuddoula clearly deemed otherwise.

It has been explained to BBC Sport that the technology used in Australia has a two-frame gap between the pictures and the sound wave.

Speaking on 7 Cricket, former international umpire Simon Taufel said: “The conclusive evidence protocols with RTS [Real Time Snickometer] – if you get a spike up to one frame past the bat, that is conclusive. And in this particular case, that is exactly what was there.

“Unfortunately, he [Sharfuddoula] didn’t want to pull the trigger quite as quickly as perhaps he could have or should have.

“The guys in the truck were doing their utmost to show him and to slow it down and to try rocking and rolling that frame.

“For me, the correct decision was made. A spike RTS after one frame past the bat, the batter has got to go.”

Vaughan said: “When Jamie Smith saw it he was walking off.

“His reaction was not a reaction of someone disgusted with that decision.

“He is a quiet guy but there was not a lot of disgruntlement with that England pair.”