Well, I can’t let yesterday’s cricket fiasco pass by without a few words, can I? The blood has boiled after all at the ineptitude of everyone involved in the England – Pakistan ball-tampering incident.
Before the crisis erupted there had been a series of bad decisions from three umpires (amazingly the man who sits and watches replays on TV even managed a howler) and both teams had cause to feel let down by the officials. Certainly the Pakistan team were at fault for staging their protest after tea, but they had cause to be aggrieved: the umpires had failed to explain properly an accusation of cheating.
The events that followed were simply a nonsense (“farcical” would be the wrong word because it implies an element of humour). “Jobsworths” were everywhere and the man who should have stepped forward – England’s captain – missed the opportunity to a) approach Inzamam directly to see if there was anything he could do to defuse the situation, and b) refuse to accept victory in the match by default
Cricket, as everyone knows, is a game which is proud of the term “spirit of cricket”. It is a wonderful builder of bridges and repairer of broken roads. Where the hell was the “spirit” of cricket yesterday? Messrs Hair, Speed and Proctor should be removed from public sight immediately, and Mr Strauss taught that captaining England is a bigger job than organising field placements.
Old fogey, less-than-totally-successful bookseller, husband, parent and grandparent holds forth on his own issues of the day.
About Me
- Rumbling Nappa
- Sometimes referred to as the Rumbling Nappa I occasionally return to blogging. This time it is to comment on the Languedoc marriage of my neice, Louise Ticehurst to Rich Astley.