London, June 17 (IANS) The international system by which rain-affected cricket matches are decided will be revised after England was beaten by West Indies in a do-or-die tie shortened by rain, a newspaper reported Wednesday.
Criticism of the Duckworth/Lewis method surfaced soon after West Indies defeated England by five wickets at the Oval cricket ground Monday to oust the host nation from the World Twenty20 championship and seal a place for themselves in the semifinals.

Although former England captain Michael Atherton Monday described Duckworth/Lewis as the best on offer, the Guardian quoted Frank Duckworth - one half of the system’s inventors - as saying it will be revised this year to better reflect the Twenty20 format.

“We will be reviewing the application of the Duckworth/Lewis method to Twenty20 during the summer when this competition is over,” Duckworth said.

“Certainly people have suggested that we need to look very carefully and see whether in fact the numbers in our formula are totally appropriate for the Twenty20 game.”

The paper said that had the changes been in place Monday, when England scored 161 for six in their allotted 20 overs, West Indies would have had to chase a marginally higher target than the 80 from nine overs that they were set.

“My suspicion is there might be a slight difference but not very much, for instance that West Indian target of 80 might go to 81 or 82,” Duckworth said.

“If there are any changes these should be ready for the commencement of the southern hemisphere season on 1 October,” said Duckworth, who, along with Tony Lewis, is contracted by the International Cricket Council to update the system periodically.

However, Duckworth was “incensed” by a rival system employed by the Indian Cricket League (ICL) known as VJD and “scorned” its Kerala-based inventor V. Jaya Devan, the paper said.

“He uses what we call a Delphic method. He tries to give people what they feel is a fair answer and he keeps fiddling his figures to do it,” said Duckworth.

“The ICC commissioned a review of all the methods about four years ago, and independent analysis showed that D/L was more rigorous and more capable of accommodating changes in the game than any other. So we’re we confident we can hold up against all challengers.”

An ICC spokesman said: “We’re happy with it and obviously all the countries that are playing in the tournament are happy with it as well because they are using it domestically.”

“It is generally accepted that D/L is the fairest method. If any of our member boards does have an alternative suggestion to Duckworth/Lewis our cricket committee will look at it, but it would be up to them to trial it in domestic cricket and bring it forward.”

The Guardian said that under the VJD method, West Indies would have had to score 94 from nine overs.