The mixed reaction it has evoked notwithstanding, the ICC says the Decision Review System (DRS) is here to stay as it has not just reduced umpiring errors but has also improved players' on-field behaviour.
In an interview, ICC Chief Executive Haroon Lorgat said umpiring errors have come down to as low as one to two per cent since the system's introduction.
"The fundamental of the review system has been to try and improve the correct decisions that are being made by the umpires and this is an aid for the umpires, it does not replace the umpires," Lorgat explained
"It supports making the correct decision and the fundamental of this system is to ensure that we don't have absolute errors in umpiring decisions," he said.
Asked whether the system would undermine the on-field officials, Lorgat said as players become more familiar with the system, frivolous appeals against umpires' decisions would come down.
"I believe players would begin to realise that this should be used when there is a poor decision, not something marginal. Not in cases where they will say, let's see if we can get away with it," he said.
DRS has been criticised by some prominent international stars like West Indies captain Chris Gayle and legendary umpire Dickie Bird. The critics of the system have argued that DRS adds to the pressure on the umpires.
Lorgat, however, rejected such apprehensions and also denied recent reports that English umpire Mark Benson retired after feeling humiliated at being overruled by the system during an Australia-West Indies match.
"I can tell you it's not true. I don't think it puts pressure on umpires. All the umpires have responded to us very positively. A lot of them, including Mark Benson, have felt that they are better going to sleep at night knowing that they have made the right decision, then to go to bed at night seeing repeats on the screen of their errors," he said.
"So they are in support of the system and don't forget, five or six per cent was the error rate before the system, this has now improved to one or two per cent. Now will you ever get an 100 per cent, perhaps never but we are as close to it as we possibly can and that's the purpose of the system," he added.
Lorgat said far from having any negative impact, DRS has unwittingly helped improve players' on-field behaviour, which was "a lot worse" a few years ago.
"...one of the unintended benefits of DRS is the behaviour of players. You would see a much better player behaviour in the recent times," he claimed.
Lorgat said players have been conducting themselves rather well in recent times but conceded that there have been odd episodes where things have gotten out of hand.
"I think players' behaviour is very good, there will always be that competition or that competitive edge that would sometimes be crossed and it becomes perhaps outside of the code of good behaviour and we have got the process to deal with it," Lorgat said.
"But generally speaking, the player behaviour has been very good. We have got high levels of competition and that's what we want," he added.
The volume of cricket has been on the rise in the past few years but Lorgat said there is hardly anything the ICC can do as player burn-out is an issue that the individual boards need to tackle.
"It's a true statement that players are playing more cricket these days and it is also a fair statement that we need to be concerned about about the volume of cricket and that responsibility wrests with all of us, the ICC, the member boards as well as the players themselves," he said.
"The administrators must be conscious of scheduling. For me it's a collective responsibility because everybody has got a hand in managing the volume. The countries bilaterally arrange series, they could arrange 10, five or three one-dayers plus five Test matches, they can congest it. There is nothing that that the ICC can do about it," he added.
Asked if greed for money is the reason why boards are squeezing in more and more matches in their bilateral calendars, he said "You should ask the BCCI about it, we are not responsible for that scheduling".
