Why don't we trust technology in sport?

For a few minutes on Sunday afternoon, Wimbledon's Centre Court became the perfect encapsulation of the current tensions between humans and machines. When Britain's Sonay Kartal hit a backhand long on a crucial point, her opponent Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova knew it had landed out. She said the umpire did too. Television replays proved it. But the electronic line-calling system - which means humans have been fully replaced this year following earlier trials - remained silent. Minutes ticked by. The human umpire eventually declared the point should be replayed. This time Pavlyuchenkova lost it. She went on to win the match but, in that moment, she told the umpire the game had been 'stolen' from her. She wondered aloud if it might be because Kartal was British. It later emerged the reason was a more mundane, but still quintessentially human reason: someone had accidentally switched the line judge off. That simple explanation hasn't stopped disgruntled discussions that - unlike strawberries, Pimm's and tantrums - the tech does not deserve a place among Wimbledon traditions. John McEnroe might have been a lot less famous in his prime if he hadn't had any human judges to yell at. More recently, Britain's Emma Raducanu expressed "disappointment" with the new technology after querying its decisions during her match on Friday Former Wimbledon champion Pat Cash disagrees. "The electronic line-calling is definitely better than the human eye," he told the BBC. "I have always been for it, since day one. Computer errors will come at times, but generally speaking, the players are happy with it. "There have been a lot of conversations with players and coaches about the line-calling not being 100% this week. But it is still better than humans." He's right: the tech is demonstrably more accurate than the human eye across various sports. Diego Maradona's notorious 'Hand of God' goal at the 1986 World Cup would probably not have got past artificial intelligence. Wimbledon's electronic line-calling (ELC) system has been developed by the firm Hawk-Eye. It uses 12 cameras to track balls across each court and also monitors the feet of players as they serve. The data is analysed in real time with the help of AI, and the whole thing is managed by a team of 50 human operators. ELC has a rotation of 24 different human voices to announce its decisions, recorded by various tennis club members and tour guides. It may use artificial intelligence to analyse the footage, but the All England Lawn Tennis Club says AI is not used to directly officiate. The club also says it remains confident in the tech, and CEO Sally Bolton told the BBC she believes it's the best in the business. "We have the most accurate officiating we could possibly have here," she said. However, following Sunday's incident, it can now no longer be manually deactivated.