Hair ready to get it right

Confidence the key for veteran umpire

Last updated: 20th May 2008

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Hair: Old Trafford return

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Darrell Hair will stand in his first Test for nearly two years at Old Trafford on Friday confident that he can get the key decisions right.

The controversial Australian umpire was regarded as one of the world's best before being banned in the aftermath of the forfeited Test at the Oval in September 2006, when Hair accused Pakistan of ball-tampering.

He returns for the second Test between England and New Zealand after undertaking a rehabilitation programme and agreeing to drop a claim of racial discrimination against the ICC.

"I think the decision-making ability is still there, the only thing that could change that is a lack of confidence because I haven't been out there," Hair told Inside Australian Cricket.

"Provided I get the right processes and triggers into place in my technique on a ball-by-ball basis, I'm confident I'll be able to make the majority of correct decisions.

Confident

"If that turns out to be otherwise, then I'd probably need to look at if I am still capable of umpiring at an international level, but at the moment I feel confident in my abilities and the fact that I can do it."

Hair, who has umpired 76 Tests and 135 one-day internationals, stressed: "Confidence is extremely important (for an umpire) because when you have confidence you don't second guess yourself.

"When your confidence is down and you've made a few errors that you're aware of and realise that you shouldn't have made, that really does knock your confidence around and it goes around in your head.

"The old adage of 'forget about it and think about the next ball'... it's very difficult and anyone who says they can do that all the time is probably not being very truthful."

Scrutiny

Asked what he thought had changed during his spell away from the game at the highest level, Hair added: "If it's at all possible, the intensity of scrutiny on umpiring decisions and a lack of understanding I suppose as to how difficult the job is.

"That's not meant to be a criticism. The media have their own job to do and they have to report the game as it is and if mistakes are made, that's fine.

"But I think people need to take into account more the difficulty of particular matches. Some matches are more difficult than others and there's no doubt about that."