Oops, my previous post should have a different subject title.
here is the one about Sledging and Bob Woolmer...
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Odds and trends - recent gleanings from the world of
cricket
Prem Panicker
<snip>
Thou shalt not sledge
On the eve of the first Test between South Africa and
Australia at the Wanderers', in Johannesburg, South
African coach Bob Woolmer in a media briefing said
something that I reproduce verbatim: "Sledging? I am all
in favour. Cricket wouldn't be the same without it, and I
hope it never changes. As long as verbal abuse does not
become too personal or vitriolic, it can actually
stimulate the players. I learnt the art of sledging from
the Australians, and came to enjoy it. It is unfair to ask
cricketers to play in front of a crowd of 30,000, with
millions more watching on television, and expect them to
show no emotion."
Ah?! How very, very interesting indeed. I wonder if Mr
Woolmer, who has come out strongly in defense of sledging,
has in his time as player and later as coach ever come
across a document put out by the ICC, and headlined Code
of Conduct for international fixtures? If he has, has he
skimmed through the same? And in course of his skimming,
has his eye been arrested, even momentarily, by Clause
two, which specifically says that all forms of verbal
aggression on the field of play, defined in the vernacular
as sledging, is expressly forbidden?
When rules of play forbid a particular practise, how then
does the coach of an international team get away with
supporting it? Are rules meant to be enforced, or can we
in these lax modern times pick and choose the rules that
we will obey, and the ones we won't?
Mr Woolmer talks of the pressures of playing cricket
before millions. By the same token, those millions react
very strongly when one of their favourite players fail,
right? Right. So let us say X is batting, gets a ball
which he edges onto his pads, and the umpire gives him out
LBW. Is it then okay, given the pressures of playing, and
failing before, millions of spectators for player X to
refuse to heed the decision of the umpire, and to stand on
his own conviction that he is not out?
Frankly, it is rather sad that a coach of Woolmer's
stature should make a comment of this nature in a public
forum. If he believes that an existing rule is wrong, then
the right place to debate it is in the ICC - one thing a
responsible official cannot do is defend as acceptable a
practise that the game's governing body has expressly
outlawed.
Wicket, wicket ways
When a touring side visits India and succumbs to spin, the
cry goes up: 'India doctors its pitches to suit its
bowlers'.
Which, frankly, is true. What surprises me, though, is why
this outcry is only heard when teams are visiting India.
Are we to understand that this is a uniquely Indian
practise? That no other side prepares its wickets to suit
its own strengths?
In this context, a statement made by Clive Lloyd, manager
of the West Indies team, before the recently concluded
first Cable and Wireless Test between India and West
Indies is interesting. On Monday March 2, Lloyd gave an
interview to a Kingston, Jamaica newspaper in which he
blasted the Jamaica Cricket Association and the
groundstaff thereof for preparing a placid wicket for the
first Test against India at Sabina Park.
Two days later, on Wednesday, Lloyd addressed a media
conference and again reiterated his disappointment and
disgust with the wicket that had been prepared at the
venue. And he lashed the groundstaff for failing to
provide a wicket that would have been to the advantage of
the home team. "The Sabina Park wicket for the first Test
is not to our liking," LLoyd said. "In fact, it is a
disaster. This is not the way a home advantage should be
utilised."
Reading between the lines, it does appear that other teams
are not averse to tailoring home wickets to their own
advantage. Fair enough. But then, why do these same teams
react with such palpable anger and outrage when they tour
India and find the home side doing the same?
From heroes to zeroes
All through India's recent tour of South Africa, the media
there had backed its team to the hilt. In fact, a native
South African who had discovered Rediff while looking for
what the "other side" had to say, sent me an e-mail which
I quote in part: "I was glad to stumble across your site
and read a refreshingly different point of view, because I
was getting heartily sick of the local media. Reading the
reports in the South African press, I got the idea that
there was only one team playing cricket out there, and
that team the very best in the world, probably the best of
all time..."
Less than a fortnight later, South Africa went down to its
worst ever defeat in 33 years when Australia wrapped up
the first Test of the ongoing series by a margin of an
innings and 196 runs. And guess what? The South African
media's response was a blistering attack on the home side
- the same media, mind you, that had before the Test began
had hyped it as the contest to decide the unofficial world
championship of Test cricket.
After the first Test, however, the unanimous verdict is
"No contest". "South Africa's prospects in the remaining
two Tests look dire, because it has no better prospects to
fall back on," went an editorial in a leading daily. And
almost every single article in the local press slammed the
home side as a bunch of over-hyped cricketers.
Funny, isn't it, how we in the media raise teams sky high
after a win, and slam them following a defeat? The sense
of balance, of perspective, seems sadly missing from both
the media and the fans, of late. The fact of the matter is
that there are nine nations that have been accorded full
Test-playing status by the ICC and of late, the playing
field has pretty much levelled itself out. Today, each of
those nations are capable of beating any of the others on
their day. Recent results are an indication of this
overturning of the formbook - England makes heavy weather
of it in Zimbabwe, then wins handily against the higher
rated New Zealand. Sri Lanka, riding the World Champions
of one-day cricket tag, goes down to the Kiwis in the
longer version of the game. South Africa, supposedly the
pretenders to the world crown, are blasted inside of the
distance by Australia. And I'll lay you whatever odds you
like that before the ongoing season ends, you will find
even more astonishing results to underline this point.
Meanwhile, the media goes its merry way, building teams up
one day, ripping them to shreds the next. Mike Atherton
could write a book on the subject - the boy wonder of
England cricket was pilloried following the Zimbabwe tour,
but following the win over New Zealand, he is once again
being hyped as the greatest thing to have happened to
English cricket since W G Grace.
I wonder if the people who put individuals, and teams, on
pedestals and topple them again the day after are aware of
the enormous pressures they are subjecting the players,
and the teams, to?
In an earlier age, when you read a cricket report, you
knew what happened on the field of play. Today,
'reportage' is mostly sound and fury, signifying very
little.
But then again, as a friend pointed out, this is the age
of hard-sell.
<more snip>
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