Hawk-Eye is probably best known for supplying the goal-line technology for the FIFA World Cup in 2014, but the sports technology company is responsible for much more across the wide spectrum of sports. Ranging from ball tracking to broadcasting graphics among more than 20 different sports, Hawk-Eye has their hands in about every sector of the sports sphere.
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Their latest project is a sensor that will aid cricket umpires to detect even the slightest of contact of the ball with the bat. The coin-sized sensor attaches to the bat, and wirelessly connects to a smartphone attached to the umpire’s jacket.
From there, an umpire will be able to watch replays of the ball’s trajectory and the area with which the ball nicked the bat. A batsman refusing to walk away from the crease even though they made slight contact with the ball has been a serious issue in cricket since its invention, and this small device will look to solve the problem.
Local club teams in England will first test the system, and its success there will then be determined for its use at higher levels of the game. If it proves itself in this sphere, this will be a huge step forward for the cricket community, as its relatively low price of £25 ($36) will mean that even youth players will have access to it.
If this Hawk-Eye “snickometer” proves useful to the game of cricket, this could be applied to any sport that needs to detect even the smallest contact. Immediately thinking, this could be used in cricket’s equivalent to American sports—baseball. The ability for an umpire to detect an even slight foul ball, in those rare situations, could be a vital move for a big-money league like Major League Baseball.
We will certainly be watching how this new tech is implemented into a sport that could definitely benefit from its implementation.