More »
Showing posts with label ICC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ICC. Show all posts
International Cricket As We Know It Is Already Dead
The Bangladesh Cricket Board has announced that the first edition of the Bangladesh Premier League will commence from the 9th of February, 2012. The tournament appears to be modelled along the same lines as the Indian Premier League, even rather unnecessarily incorporating the (now discontinued) concept of "icon" players, which was only employed in the IPL to retain the biggest stars from the rival ICL. The same standard T20 international bunch appear to be available. A new sports channel will broadcast the tournament in Bangladesh. Arun Lal, here after referred to as captain-flipping-the-bird-obvious, said "The main thing is that the Bangladeshi players have to be available." Fancy that, you wouldn't want it to just be the 25 international mercenaries playing now, would you?
Take a step back and put yourselves in the shoes of a Bangladeshi cricket administrator. Your team never really deserved Test status, but well, here we are. They have the worst record for any national side, are currently at the bottom of the ICC rankings and have hardly displayed any improvement since their inception. The logical thing to do therefore, is to make sure you're not left behind in the T20 leagues where everybody else is going to be making money. I mean, after all, what is your role as cricket administrator of the country if not to oversee governance of the sport, ensure that you produce cricketers of international calibre who are capable of competing with the best? But whats in it for you, potentially honorable member, apart from maybe getting a few business contracts for your firm while doing this charitable work?
Now take a step back and look at how the pervasive nature of this greed has gripped cricket administrators the world over. Virtually every cricket board has already designed, if not implemented, a T20 league which will eventually become the staple of cricket for that country. Test cricket fans moan about how this will affect the premier format of the game, but they are blind, romantic and ultimately stupid. Sorry! It isn't Test cricket that is threatened, it is international cricket. And it isn't threatened, its already dead. With much the same confidence as the banker who says "I see nothing wrong with hedging against CDO we're selling to investors" we've got cricket administrators pulling the wool over our collective eyes with false promises such as "There is room for all three formats."
What a laugh, there will be only one format in 10 years, and only one international tournament, a T20 world cup. They all know this, they recognized its inevitability the instant the IPL was a success despite the ICL getting the jump on it. They knew too that here was an opportunity staring them in the face, and to not grasp it while in a position of power on their board would be to lose the chance to someone more enterprising, a quite costly business opportunity lost and life only hands you so many. All of this was well known even before the ICL was launched, when Lalit Modi had already drawn out plans for a city based T20 league, but just needed the right moment to get the dinosaurs in the BCCI to understand how profitable and undeniably destined the future of cricket was to be. The current models had already shown themselves to be unsustainable, and while you can only shaft the viewer so much with ads to bag obscenely priced TV contracts, national fervour can only really throw high profits your way for marquee events, and that too only if they go to script. You need something more sustainable, a commodity that will appeal to the masses over a longer term while not ensuring that the only people who can realistically follow it enough are those employed to cover it.
T20 was that commodity, trialled immediately after broadcasters incurred massive losses following India's early exit from the 2007 World Cup. There will always be whispers about how the following T20 World Cup's script was almost too perfect to be true. It certainly was for the games administrators, as a swooned public fell hook, line and sinker for the crucial test to see if the new format would catch on. Zee knew they had to act fast, but their loss of the contract and subsequent action has been well chronicled. This paradigm shift shook the cricketing world far more than any match-fixing scandal ever can. In order to run a league, you needed to be legit. Boards regulated cricket and so they had the rightful claim to organize and manage the finances for this commercial venture. Any and everyone else was banned.
In the ideal scenario, different countries will host different leagues at different times of the year. Much the same way crass sport management has devolved and dehumanized baseball, basketball and "football" (who actually follows any of the international games in these sports, oh thats right, apart from the Olympics, there aren't any), cricket's aping administrators seek to destroy international cricket. Its a right bloody mess anyway, with all that political manoeuvring to appease egoistic puppets appointed by governments to manage sporting boards. No, having your individual fiefdom is a lot more profitable, and if everyone shares everyone's resources carefully, there's enough moolah to go around to everyone (case in point, the bending over backwards of certain boards to ensure the success of the Champions League T20). Eventually you'll end up with the sport looking not too dissimilar to football, the real kind, one world cup where national emotion can be vented every once in a while. To the uncreative aping administrators this only seems logical, it works well in other sports doesn't it, why must cricket be left behind in the dark ages?
You think you can change this? Hah! The world's got far more pressing concerns. Protests if any, will be as futile as the Occupy movements. Who regulates the game? Take a look at the shambolic state of broadcasts in the subcontinent, where some fat cat twerp says "I see NO problem in L shaped ads popping up during the game." You couldn't be bothered stepping up and demanding that you get a quality product for parting with your hard earned money then, now you've let them say "this is how you're going to like what we're going to give you, and you're going to be paying us more over time than you ever did before, and if you don't like it you'll have to learn to because its all you're going to get." Take a look at the way Ashes series are scheduled and broadcast. World cricket is a mess, and nobody really wants to govern it any more. Administrators who should have been looking to preserve the game's history and heritage, while promoting the game's proliferation have taken keen interest in petty fights that throw out associates so as to preserve the revenues of the powerful boards. Where there was supposed to be governance, there is only greed. Greed (at least for a short while) is good for the few, harmful for the many, for it after all comes at their cost. If you liked international cricket, I'd recommend you learn to move on quickly. If not to the T20 leagues, to another sport.
Take a step back and put yourselves in the shoes of a Bangladeshi cricket administrator. Your team never really deserved Test status, but well, here we are. They have the worst record for any national side, are currently at the bottom of the ICC rankings and have hardly displayed any improvement since their inception. The logical thing to do therefore, is to make sure you're not left behind in the T20 leagues where everybody else is going to be making money. I mean, after all, what is your role as cricket administrator of the country if not to oversee governance of the sport, ensure that you produce cricketers of international calibre who are capable of competing with the best? But whats in it for you, potentially honorable member, apart from maybe getting a few business contracts for your firm while doing this charitable work?
Now take a step back and look at how the pervasive nature of this greed has gripped cricket administrators the world over. Virtually every cricket board has already designed, if not implemented, a T20 league which will eventually become the staple of cricket for that country. Test cricket fans moan about how this will affect the premier format of the game, but they are blind, romantic and ultimately stupid. Sorry! It isn't Test cricket that is threatened, it is international cricket. And it isn't threatened, its already dead. With much the same confidence as the banker who says "I see nothing wrong with hedging against CDO we're selling to investors" we've got cricket administrators pulling the wool over our collective eyes with false promises such as "There is room for all three formats."
What a laugh, there will be only one format in 10 years, and only one international tournament, a T20 world cup. They all know this, they recognized its inevitability the instant the IPL was a success despite the ICL getting the jump on it. They knew too that here was an opportunity staring them in the face, and to not grasp it while in a position of power on their board would be to lose the chance to someone more enterprising, a quite costly business opportunity lost and life only hands you so many. All of this was well known even before the ICL was launched, when Lalit Modi had already drawn out plans for a city based T20 league, but just needed the right moment to get the dinosaurs in the BCCI to understand how profitable and undeniably destined the future of cricket was to be. The current models had already shown themselves to be unsustainable, and while you can only shaft the viewer so much with ads to bag obscenely priced TV contracts, national fervour can only really throw high profits your way for marquee events, and that too only if they go to script. You need something more sustainable, a commodity that will appeal to the masses over a longer term while not ensuring that the only people who can realistically follow it enough are those employed to cover it.
T20 was that commodity, trialled immediately after broadcasters incurred massive losses following India's early exit from the 2007 World Cup. There will always be whispers about how the following T20 World Cup's script was almost too perfect to be true. It certainly was for the games administrators, as a swooned public fell hook, line and sinker for the crucial test to see if the new format would catch on. Zee knew they had to act fast, but their loss of the contract and subsequent action has been well chronicled. This paradigm shift shook the cricketing world far more than any match-fixing scandal ever can. In order to run a league, you needed to be legit. Boards regulated cricket and so they had the rightful claim to organize and manage the finances for this commercial venture. Any and everyone else was banned.
In the ideal scenario, different countries will host different leagues at different times of the year. Much the same way crass sport management has devolved and dehumanized baseball, basketball and "football" (who actually follows any of the international games in these sports, oh thats right, apart from the Olympics, there aren't any), cricket's aping administrators seek to destroy international cricket. Its a right bloody mess anyway, with all that political manoeuvring to appease egoistic puppets appointed by governments to manage sporting boards. No, having your individual fiefdom is a lot more profitable, and if everyone shares everyone's resources carefully, there's enough moolah to go around to everyone (case in point, the bending over backwards of certain boards to ensure the success of the Champions League T20). Eventually you'll end up with the sport looking not too dissimilar to football, the real kind, one world cup where national emotion can be vented every once in a while. To the uncreative aping administrators this only seems logical, it works well in other sports doesn't it, why must cricket be left behind in the dark ages?
You think you can change this? Hah! The world's got far more pressing concerns. Protests if any, will be as futile as the Occupy movements. Who regulates the game? Take a look at the shambolic state of broadcasts in the subcontinent, where some fat cat twerp says "I see NO problem in L shaped ads popping up during the game." You couldn't be bothered stepping up and demanding that you get a quality product for parting with your hard earned money then, now you've let them say "this is how you're going to like what we're going to give you, and you're going to be paying us more over time than you ever did before, and if you don't like it you'll have to learn to because its all you're going to get." Take a look at the way Ashes series are scheduled and broadcast. World cricket is a mess, and nobody really wants to govern it any more. Administrators who should have been looking to preserve the game's history and heritage, while promoting the game's proliferation have taken keen interest in petty fights that throw out associates so as to preserve the revenues of the powerful boards. Where there was supposed to be governance, there is only greed. Greed (at least for a short while) is good for the few, harmful for the many, for it after all comes at their cost. If you liked international cricket, I'd recommend you learn to move on quickly. If not to the T20 leagues, to another sport.
Disgraceful England Deserve Censure But The ICC Thanks Them
Ian Bell is a good batsman. Thats all he is. He is not an umpire. He is not a match referee. He is not the sole authority on the cricket field. At some point yesterday he decided he was all of these things. He assumed that the ball was dead. Him and him alone. His batting partner, Eoin Morgan didn't. The bowler didn't. The fielder who had thrown the ball in didn't. And the umpires didn't. Yet in a supreme display of arrogance, Bell trotted over to his batting partner, who looked most uncomfortable about the whole affair since he had just put his bat in the crease after attempting to warn Bell, and knew something unfortunate was about to occur.
Make no mistake, the error was Bell's and Bell's alone, nothing but sheer stupidity. But it gets worse from here. Ignore the indignation from the English, who almost drowned twitter out with calls for Dhoni's head for, well, doing the correct thing. As the umpires asked Dhoni if he wanted to uphold the appeal, they also turned to the English batsmen and asked them to wait on the field until a decision had been made. Bell's arrogance took to the fore again and he marched off, seemingly as oblivious to their request as he seemed to the entire run out fiasco. Note that even at that point the umpires had still not called Tea, it was Bell who took it upon himself to declare the session over. Bell was actually stopped just before he left the ground to his obvious disgust by the fourth umpire, who politely reminded him that the session had not in fact officially ended.
For such blatant disregard to an umpire's authority, a player has already been penalized in this test, too bad he isn't English though, because they are praised for this sort of behavior. Already in this test we've seen Graeme Swann kick the stumps in disgust at his own performance, and despite being his second offence in under three months, escape with a reprimand. "Look here you jolly old fellow, we love your witty banter on twitter, but you can't go around kicking the stumps when you feel like it. Just quickly apologize for it and we'll sweep it under the carpet."
The most petulant and a serial offender in the English side, much like his father before him, and rewarded with T20 captaincy - this is the same bowler who is the only international cricketer to have conceded 6 sixes in an over in a T20 match - Stuart Broad, took it upon himself to step into his father's shoes and check if VVS Laxman had applied Vaseline to his bat. The English seem to think this sort of behavior is amusing, its a bit like throwing jelly beans on the pitch, its all in good fun when you're not at the receiving end. Insinuate that an Englishman might be a cheat and you'll get the response the Pakistani team received after their counter accusations during the spot fixing brouhaha.
Andrew Strauss and Andy Flower chose to approach Dhoni during the Tea interval and ask him to reconsider his appeal. This has been described as "most unorthodox" but the more simple way of describing it is that it was way out of line. You cannot go to the opposition and ask them to play in a manner that suits your players after your very players are solely responsible for an incident because of their stupidity, and especially not after the mob you're leading onto the field has already acted so disgracefully. The trouble is, nobody seems to be telling England that they're behaving terribly. Oh no, quite the opposite.
Here's how Haroon Lorgat, CEO of the ICC, described the incident and the conduct of the players. "Absolute credit must go to Team India, the England team and the match officials - Ranjan Madugalle, Asad Rauf and Marais Erasmus as well as the off-field umpires Billy Bowden and Tim Robinson - for the superb way that they all handled a tricky situation. While the initial appeal and umpire decision may have been acceptable to the letter of the law, the decision by India captain M S Dhoni and his team -as well as the Team India coaching staff - to withdraw the appeal shows great maturity. To see players and officials uphold the Great Spirit of cricket, which has underpinned the game for more than a century, is very special. I am indeed grateful for the way that the teams and match officials handled what was clearly a difficult situation and their behaviour reflects well on everyone."
I'm not sure what Lorgat is smoking, but he did get a few things right, so it might not be the best stuff out there on the market. The umpires and the Indian Team deserve praise. Don't discount the role of the umpires here, they could have chosen to act as heavy handed as Daryl Hair did at the Oval during Inzimam's protest and taken the incident to a whole different level. Madugalle's lenient reprimand to Swann and his overlooking Broad's distasteful accusation, doesn't deserve credit. And England's conduct definitely does not either. The "Great Spirit of Cricket" shouldn't win any accolades today, it was in fact insulted because it asks players to play fair, within the rules and to respect umpires. But more so because it promotes equality and equal treatment to players, and by all indications from the ICC's statement, equality seems to be used rather judiciously, and certainly selectively.
Make no mistake, the error was Bell's and Bell's alone, nothing but sheer stupidity. But it gets worse from here. Ignore the indignation from the English, who almost drowned twitter out with calls for Dhoni's head for, well, doing the correct thing. As the umpires asked Dhoni if he wanted to uphold the appeal, they also turned to the English batsmen and asked them to wait on the field until a decision had been made. Bell's arrogance took to the fore again and he marched off, seemingly as oblivious to their request as he seemed to the entire run out fiasco. Note that even at that point the umpires had still not called Tea, it was Bell who took it upon himself to declare the session over. Bell was actually stopped just before he left the ground to his obvious disgust by the fourth umpire, who politely reminded him that the session had not in fact officially ended.
For such blatant disregard to an umpire's authority, a player has already been penalized in this test, too bad he isn't English though, because they are praised for this sort of behavior. Already in this test we've seen Graeme Swann kick the stumps in disgust at his own performance, and despite being his second offence in under three months, escape with a reprimand. "Look here you jolly old fellow, we love your witty banter on twitter, but you can't go around kicking the stumps when you feel like it. Just quickly apologize for it and we'll sweep it under the carpet."
The most petulant and a serial offender in the English side, much like his father before him, and rewarded with T20 captaincy - this is the same bowler who is the only international cricketer to have conceded 6 sixes in an over in a T20 match - Stuart Broad, took it upon himself to step into his father's shoes and check if VVS Laxman had applied Vaseline to his bat. The English seem to think this sort of behavior is amusing, its a bit like throwing jelly beans on the pitch, its all in good fun when you're not at the receiving end. Insinuate that an Englishman might be a cheat and you'll get the response the Pakistani team received after their counter accusations during the spot fixing brouhaha.
Andrew Strauss and Andy Flower chose to approach Dhoni during the Tea interval and ask him to reconsider his appeal. This has been described as "most unorthodox" but the more simple way of describing it is that it was way out of line. You cannot go to the opposition and ask them to play in a manner that suits your players after your very players are solely responsible for an incident because of their stupidity, and especially not after the mob you're leading onto the field has already acted so disgracefully. The trouble is, nobody seems to be telling England that they're behaving terribly. Oh no, quite the opposite.
Here's how Haroon Lorgat, CEO of the ICC, described the incident and the conduct of the players. "Absolute credit must go to Team India, the England team and the match officials - Ranjan Madugalle, Asad Rauf and Marais Erasmus as well as the off-field umpires Billy Bowden and Tim Robinson - for the superb way that they all handled a tricky situation. While the initial appeal and umpire decision may have been acceptable to the letter of the law, the decision by India captain M S Dhoni and his team -as well as the Team India coaching staff - to withdraw the appeal shows great maturity. To see players and officials uphold the Great Spirit of cricket, which has underpinned the game for more than a century, is very special. I am indeed grateful for the way that the teams and match officials handled what was clearly a difficult situation and their behaviour reflects well on everyone."
I'm not sure what Lorgat is smoking, but he did get a few things right, so it might not be the best stuff out there on the market. The umpires and the Indian Team deserve praise. Don't discount the role of the umpires here, they could have chosen to act as heavy handed as Daryl Hair did at the Oval during Inzimam's protest and taken the incident to a whole different level. Madugalle's lenient reprimand to Swann and his overlooking Broad's distasteful accusation, doesn't deserve credit. And England's conduct definitely does not either. The "Great Spirit of Cricket" shouldn't win any accolades today, it was in fact insulted because it asks players to play fair, within the rules and to respect umpires. But more so because it promotes equality and equal treatment to players, and by all indications from the ICC's statement, equality seems to be used rather judiciously, and certainly selectively.
5 reasons why we will see India playing the finals
1. Finally they have started to know their responsibilities and play well as a team (we saw that in the QF)… Now it is the added responsibility of the ICC and BCCI that it ends well too
2. Pakistan might play Akhtar... And a good part of the team wouldn’t want to win the match because that will mean Akhtar would leave on a high… Above all, Misbah wants him to play when Afridi doesn’t want to play him… So Afridi might just play him and not let him play his play… So they are a big mess
3. Dhoni has to get his opportunity to justify, “See I told you how good the team is, you guys didn’t believe us, but we believed in ourselves and the belief has paid off… And of course you now know how good captaincy was, how important it was for winning and how the bowlers, batsmen and fielders have to improve and play for the team rather than playing to the gallery… And, thank you Sachin for presenting us this opportunity”
4. You have the IPL coming and you don’t want the Indian public to shut themselves off… Stone the lovely properties of our cricketers, defecate in their backyards, avoid the lathi charging police in the stadium & spoil the fun and stop the big money flowing
5. BCCI wouldn’t want Modi tweeting, “See, those morons can’t even get their team play a final”
2. Pakistan might play Akhtar... And a good part of the team wouldn’t want to win the match because that will mean Akhtar would leave on a high… Above all, Misbah wants him to play when Afridi doesn’t want to play him… So Afridi might just play him and not let him play his play… So they are a big mess
3. Dhoni has to get his opportunity to justify, “See I told you how good the team is, you guys didn’t believe us, but we believed in ourselves and the belief has paid off… And of course you now know how good captaincy was, how important it was for winning and how the bowlers, batsmen and fielders have to improve and play for the team rather than playing to the gallery… And, thank you Sachin for presenting us this opportunity”
4. You have the IPL coming and you don’t want the Indian public to shut themselves off… Stone the lovely properties of our cricketers, defecate in their backyards, avoid the lathi charging police in the stadium & spoil the fun and stop the big money flowing
5. BCCI wouldn’t want Modi tweeting, “See, those morons can’t even get their team play a final”
Back To School for U(niversity)DRS
An annoyed ICC thought MSD had his understanding of the DRS rules miles off target and his mouth open something like 2.5 m too wide. So the good folks there have gone ahead and complicated them even further. The relevant rule is now something like this :
If the ball pitches 2.5 m or more in front of the stumps and the distance covered by the ball between pitching and hitting the pads is 40 cm and the sine of the angle between the two as a factor of the cosine within 3 standard deviations of the tangent times pi such that relative velocity is maintained with an alpha coefficient of 0.3 and a cosmic constant of 0.297 on the log scale ceteris paribus , then the decision will be based on a combination of extrapolated determinants drawn from the relevant probability distribution and chi-square analysis.
Any wonder then that the very young and even more talented Mhd. Aamer has decided to go back to school for a , er , spot of education ? A literary-minded old wag was moved to quip the following lines - in quite poor taste one must add :
"O' young rookie !
Thou goest , as it looks
From your bookies
To your books"
Good luck Aamer , be back on the cricket field soon. We need you in the school of international cricket.
From which it appears young K.Akmal could be close to dropping out.
The Chennai Pitch is Unacceptable : ICC
The ICC's Global Committee for Excellence and High Standards in Pitches was unimpressed by the Chennai pitch on which the last ODI of the India- New Zealand series was played on Friday.
The clean shaven executives of the G.C.E.H.S.P noted that nine wickets fell to spinners for just 96 runs at a venue which will be hosting the ODI World Cup matches in two months time. They stressed that the both teams and pitches need to last 100 overs to match the expectations of the entertaining contests that previous editions of the World Cup have set.
Brushing aside the overcast conditions on the day, poor shot selection and umpiring mishaps, the executives said that a pitch which provides an unfair advantage to any one skill set such as spin bowling is detrimental to the health of the game. "It significantly reduces the span of a game and cheats the paying public of their money's worth of entertainment, regardless of whether the players involved manage to make a game of it or not" said one unnamed clean shaven executive.
The extent of action the committee might take on the substandard pitch is unclear, also unclear is when the next step might be taken given the paucity of time before the mega even kicks off in February.
Nevertheless, nervous officials await further communication from Dubai.
Crownish also blogs at the FCKingblog
My Two Cents
I don't give a jot about Pakistan Cricket. Never have, never will. And there are plenty of reasons not to warm up to the shenanigans of the PCB, especially under Ijaz Butt.
That said, I do care deeply about due process. And right now, 4 Pakistanis, and their national team,are being destroyed by innuendo, rumor and trial by media.
And that is absolutely not fair.
A charge has been made, the onus is now with the people making that charge to prove it. If proven, mete out the maximum punishments possible on the accused because failure to do so with give root to more innuendo, rumor and trial by media.
If the charges are not proven, I would implore the ICC to take the lead in whatever legal action necessary to right the wrongs.
And while we are at it, spare a thought for the accused. Irrespective of the outcome of the process, the four main accused are going to spend the rest of their lives living under the shadow of innuendo. The next time Aamer bowls a no ball, however marginal,what are the odds that it will be accepted as such?
And therein lies the real shame of this sorry state of affairs.
fixing saga: whom to blame...?
a call from bored member, naked cricket, was enough to shake me from the slumber of a lazy sunday afternoon...
since then i've been slipping from one emotion to another... but one thought which refuses to go away is... what was the ICC ACU (Anti Corruption Unit) doing all this while...?
as the video footage shows... it was THAT easy to spot fix... suddenly a reporter decides to check if it can be done and it was a cakewalk for him once the thought of this sting operation came to him....
and to think that actually ICC charge millions for ACU fees supposedly to keep the cricket clean... to keep not only the fixers at bay but preempt any move they may plan and nab them there and then...
but what does ACU actually do...?
now we know for sure, they just sleep... booze at respective board's expenses... stay in plush suites... screw cricket... and actually get paid for it...
and to think that pundits wrote scathing articles on bcci for not being serious about match fixing by not taking ICC ACU on board for ipl...
for what...? this...?
pak cricketers will get their just deserts... but will ACU officials ever be charged for their ineptness and failures...?
before you pound me for suggesting... consider this... when heads can roll for security lapses why not for such a serious...heinous cricketing lapse...?
FIFA join hands with ICC...
it had to happen some day...
although there have been some career threatening injuries....that have made the selectors look like fools... and left the team high and dry with unexpected turn of events, nothing has deterred cricketers from promoting football...
with cricketers hellbent on promoting the beautiful game whether they are about to play routine matches or sometimes even an important match... fifa felt humbled by the relentless efforts of cricketers, specially the coaching staff who come up with 'relaxation' exercises despite receiving some indifferent results, to promote football whenever they can...
finally fifa has relented and joined hands with icc... from now on in all football matches, footballers will play cricket in their spare time... pre or post match and whenever they can... this will not only help them relax... bind the team together... but will also help the globalisation of cricket because of football's obvious reach...
naturally the cricket fans world over are jubilant, looking forward to catch some action... but this time... in football matches...
Any contest doesn't become dirty if politicians are invloved in it
It's not necessary to look at any situation in which politicians are involved as a political battle. As when a group of powerful people contest for key positions in a democratic set up, irrespective of them being politicians or not & the name one assigns to the contest, it always needs garnering support. So there's no question of who stooped more (as politics obsessed Indian media and mindset wants us to believe).
The balance of cricket economics has surely shifted towards the Asian block,owing both to numbers and cricket craziness; so whenever people contest for democratic bodies, the tilt will invariably be towards the block of the Asian cricket playing nations. This has been proved time and again.
John Howard got the pasting, as Pawar has to be the ICC president; and as a consequence John Howard can't take the subordinate's post, as someone who supported Pawar has to get the honour of filling the smaller chair.
So it's not necessary to consume the usual 'the politicians playing dirty tricks on each other' debate all the time. Media, particularly the Indian media knows what Indian psyche likes to hear and see, and that's why it incorporates the 'dirty politics angle' wherever it sees politicians involved.
So the John Howard incident is just a contest where powerful and influential got involved.We better believe it like this. Rest is just for the consumption of masses.
A disingenious argument
Writing in the Age, Peter Roebuck makes the argument that while there is plenty to dislike about the Howard nomination for the post of ICC Vice President, once the NZC and CA proposed his name, it is incumbent on all other members of the ICC to accept this without murmur as this has been ICC convention.
To buttress this claim, Roebuck cites the examples of Ray May Mali,Percy Sonn, Peter Chingoka. To quote from the article
"A board that welcomed Percy Sonn, who declared the 2003 Zimbabwe election free and fair though he knew it was a lie, thereby condemning Zimbabweans to years of torment; a board that accepted Ray Mali, whose co-operation with the apartheid government was exposed by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission; a board that listens to Peter Chingoka and Ozias Bute, apologists for evil in Zimbabwe, is poorly placed to turn its back on Jack the Ripper, let alone a former PM and cricket fanatic."And this reasoning is flawed.
Because what Percy Sonn or Ray Mali did in their previous avatars ( before becoming cricket administrators) is not relevant. Neither is Peter Chingoka's being an apologist to Robert Mugabe.
Because no one is opposiing John Howard's candidature because of Tampa incident or his support for the war in Iraq. The opposition is to Howard, the incumbent ICC Vice President, not Howard, the ex Prime Minister of Australia.
And by trying to extrapolate one to the other,Peter Roebuck makes for a disingenuous argument.
Pity, because he does articulate the more logical reasons for why SA or Zimbabwe might oppose John Howard later in the piece.
Lalit Modi - Love him, hate him…
He didn’t allow a free regime in sports.
Any sport or game shouldn’t be the franchise of only the rich, famous and powerful. If you look at Golf (in India), which is supposedly a sport only the rich and famous indulge into there are many among the top 10-20 golfers in the country who started off as caddies. Don’t think these are the Steve William’s of India. These are kids from poor families who worked in a club fetching the bag and balls of the rich and famous. I am not sure if the golfing establishment in India did anything to throttle these caddie turned players, leave alone small bickering here and there. I am talking about organized throttle here.
That is precisely why I don’t like Lalit Modi, the way he throttled ICL. And in effect took away a valuable couple of years from some promising Indian talent, the way he did it was despicable. I am sure we remember the extent his regime stooped to those days. Denying use of facility for those who signed up to the ICL, cancelling the pension of the ex-cricketers who were part of ICL were some gems we would remember. If only the PCR (Prevention of Civil Rights) Act of 1955 could be used against the IPL, there might me more cases than all those pending cases in the Indian courts.
But as they say “Every dog has its day”. Modi had his day and also saw its end. And when it did end, it ended as a shock to him of course and to the cricketing world as a whole. While one could say he has been paid back by the same coin, it might be a little harsh to say that.
Whatever he is, this is the man who made the Indian cricketing establishment sit up, be respected and feared by the other boards and the ICC. The man whose marketing techniques ensured the world had to buy the arguments of Shashank Manohar’s father Mr. Manohar and let “The Obnoxious Weed” off (make no mistake, I am not justifying what the Aussies did). It is the Indian money that the other cricket boards envy and fear about.
And Modi got them the money and with it came the new muscle.
Although Modi hijacked the idea from ICL, he still applied his mind like every boss in the world does to give that idea a bit of tweak and make it his.
There wasn’t a concept of franchise in ICL, Modi got all his rich, famous & powerful friends to come in and buy a team. There were people who said he is copying the western model of club sports, that he was trying to replicate the Super Bowl. There were also a few who went a bit farther and said IPL would the Super bowel (aka Shit) of cricket. That it would fail, collapse etc. We have seen 3 editions till date, and one last year where Modi took on the Indian government and moved the IPL to South Africa. Still, it was successful.
IPL gave life, money and fame to almost everyone who talked, wrote or involved in it. Including those who wrote books about the IPL model, talked about the economics of the league and even to a guy who masqueraded as a Fake IPL Player during the last season. This guy is now promoting his book across platforms, thanks to IPL & more importantly to its creator, Lalit Modi.
A couple of years ago we only saw shirts & trousers (of players) that had a logo. Modi rewrote the rules, now we see many logos that make up the shirt & trouser. Advertisers thought T20 was too quick a game that doesn’t offer enough advertising time. Modi made sure there were enough advertisements (meaning many happy advertisers who feasted on the eyeballs that IPL created) by creating the concept of a “Timeout” in cricket. He even branded the hits, catches, misses and almost everything imaginable in the game and even more like the annoying blimp, commercials on the big screen in the ground between balls.
Now that the business model is established and is getting the returns BCCI wanted, they don’t want Modi. This is typical of the BCCI and the brand of politics we have seen there. Dalmiya, Rungta, Lele, Dungarpur are examples of those who fell prey to the same brand of politics they espoused.
In all these there are some interesting questions that might well have some very interesting answers. Will we have those interesting answers out in the public domain is a million dollar question. Sp here are the questions…
You had a IPL governing council with some full and part time politicians as members. Would you want to exonerate those governing council members and bring in charges only on Modi?
Shouldn’t a Rajeev Shukla or a Sunil Gavaskar or Ravi Shastri be equally held responsible for what has happened?
Is Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi’s “we should have… We didn’t ” interviews in media be considered an excuse to let the governing council off while Modi is vilified?
How justified is Shashank Manohar trying to put the blame squarely on the professionals who were part of the IPL set up for all that has happened ?
To top it all, this is probably the second time Sharad Pawar has been unusually quiet since the food grain shortage issue was discussed in the Indian parliament.
All this said… I think Modi is going to make a comeback soon as the IPL commissioner. What do you think?
It happens only in Indian cricket!!
Shahid Afridi is an idiot!
Per Cricinfo
Afridi, leading Pakistan in the absence of Mohammad Yousuf, was caught by TV cameras apparently biting the ball on a couple of occasions. This was reported to the on-field umpires by the TV umpire and, after a chat with Afridi, the umpires changed the ball.Afridi was called into a hearing with the match referee Ranjan Madugalle immediately after the match. Madugalle said Afridi pleaded guilty to the charge, apologised and regretted his action.
And the reason Shahid Afridi is an idiot is not because he bit the ball. He is an idiot because he acquiesced to changing the ball after talking to the umpires. Had he not, there would have been no ban. And with no ban, there would have been nothing to keep the main stream and alternate medias aflame for two days after the incident.And the incident itself would be consigned to the dust bin.Or limited to the fading memories of the people who saw the incident, directly or otherwise.
Because there is precedent.And no, I am not talking Stuart Broad's naughty spikes or James Anderson's touch of love. Think back to Australia's tour of India in 2008
In terms of what transpired, there is very little to separate the two incidents. Except that in one case, the ball was changed after talking to the captain and in the other, it wasnt.
And in the meantime, the presiding deity of all things cricket had this to say
He should know.. It is the only plausible explanation for him bowling part timers when a test match, and the series, were at stake.
last effort to save test cricket...
give him the same dose but at night...
and yes... change the color of medicine to pink...
All I want for Christmas
is a ban or a fine, or both! Let me explain -
16 Dec day 1 - South Africa 1st innings 262/4 (JH Kallis 112*, JP Duminy 38*, 90 ov) - 90 overs
17 Dec day 2 - England 1st innings 88/1 (AJ Strauss 44*, IJL Trott 18*, 23 ov) SA all out 153.2 overs + 2 overs for change of innings + 23 -90 = 89 overs
18 Dec day 3 - South Africa 2nd innings 9/1 (GC Smith 6*, PL Harris 2*, 4 ov) GB all out in 104 overs + 2 overs for change of innings + 4 -23 = 87 overs
19 Dec day 4 - England 2nd innings 11/1 (AN Cook 4*, JM Anderson 6*, 6 ov) SA declared 85.5 overs + 2 overs for change of innings + 6 - 4 = 88 overs
20 Dec day 5 - England 2nd innings 228/9 (96 ov) - end of match - 90 overs
On the final day, play went on 44 minutes past the scheduled close of play.
From BBC Sport - Day 1 start 0832 end 1546 - Duration 7 hrs 14 mins
Day 2 start 0833 end 1600 - Duration 7 hrs 27 mins
Day 3 start 0834 end 1600 - Duration 7 hrs 26 mins
Day 4 start 0835 end 1558 - Duration 7 hrs 23 mins
Day 5 start 0833 end 1628 - Duration 7 hrs 55 mins
Now, from the ICC's Standard Test Match Playing Conditions
16.1 Start and Cessation Times
The Home Board shall determine the hours of play, subject to there being 6 hours scheduled play per day (Pakistan, a minimum of 5 hours), and subject to:
16.1.1 Minimum Overs in the Day
Subject to clause 16.1.2 below:
a) On days other than the last day, play shall continue on each day until the completion of a minimum target of 90 overs (or a minimum of 15 overs per hour) or the completion of the scheduled or rescheduled cessation time, which ever is the later but provided that play shall not continue for more than 30 minutes beyond the scheduled or rescheduled cessation time (permitted overtime). For the sake of clarity, if any of the minimum target number of overs have not been bowled at the completion of the permitted overtime, play shall cease upon completion of the over in progress. The overs not bowled shall not be made up on any subsequent day. b) On the last day, a minimum of 75 overs (or a minimum of 15 overs per hour) shall be bowled during the playing time other than the last hour of the match where clause 16.1.6 below shall apply. If any of the minimum of 75 overs, or as recalculated, have not been bowled when one hour of the scheduled playing time remains, the last hour of the match for the purposes of clause 16.1.6 shall be the hour immediately following the completion of these overs.
16.1.5 Change of Innings
Where there is a change of innings during a days play (exceptwhere the change of innings occurs at lunch or tea or when playis suspended for any reason) 2 overs will be deducted from theminimum number of overs to be bowled.The over in progress at the end of an innings is regarded as acompleted over for the purposes of determining the minimumnumber of remaining overs to be bowled in the day.
16.1.6 Last Hour
Law 16.6, 16.7 and 16.8 will apply except that a minimum of 15 overs shall be bowled in the last hour and all calculations with regard to suspensions of play or the start of a new innings shall be based on 1 over for each full 4 minutes (refer clause 16.1.9 below). On the final day, if both captains (the batsmen at the wicket may act for their captain) accept that there is no prospect of either side achieving a victory, they may agree to finish the match after (a) the time for the commencement of the last hour has been reached OR (b) there are a minimum of 15 overs to be bowled, whichever is the later.
15 Law 15 - Intervals
15.1 Law 15.3 - Duration of intervals
15.1.1 Luncheon Interval: The interval shall be of 40 minutes duration.
15.1.2 Tea Interval: The interval shall be of 20 minutes duration.
-
Factoring in 2 drinks intervals per day ( of 4 mins duration each), we get
Day 1 Actual Playing Time 6 hrs 6 mins
Day 2 Actual Playing Time 6 hrs 19 mins
Day 3 Actual Playing Time 6 hrs 18 mins
Day 4 Actual Playing Time 6 hrs 15 mins
Day 5 Actual Playing Time 6 hrs 47 mins
Now , from the ICC CODE OF CONDUCT FOR PLAYERS AND PLAYER SUPPORT PERSONNEL,
2 Calculating the Actual Over Rate
2.1 The actual over rate will be calculated at the end of each International Matchby those Umpires appointed to officiate in such International Match. In the case of Test Matches (or other International Matches of at least four days in duration), the actual over rate will be the average rate which is achieved by the fielding team across both of the batting team’s innings.
2.2 In calculating the actual over rate for an International Match, allowances will be given for the actual time lost as a result of any of the following:
2.2.1 treatment given to a Player by an authorised medical personnel on the field of play;
2.2.2 a Player being required to leave the field as a result of a serious injury;
2.2.3 all third Umpire referrals and consultations;
2.2.4 time wasting by the batting side (which may, in addition, constitute a separate offence pursuant to any of Articles 2.1.8, 2.2.11, 2.3.3 or 2.4.4 depending upon the context and seriousness of the incident); and 2.2.5 all other circumstance that are beyond the control of the fielding team.
2.3 In addition, the following time allowances will only be given in Test Matches (or other International Matches of at least four days in duration):
2.3.1 2 minutes per wicket taken, provided that such wicket results in the subsequent batsmen immediately commencing his innings.
For the avoidance of any doubt, no time allowance will be given for the final wicket of an innings or where a wicket falls immediately prior to any interval; and
2.3.2 4 minutes per drinks break taken (one per session).
2.5.2 where the actual over rate in any Test Match or any other International Match of at least four days in duration is more than five overs short of the Minimum Over Rate, or, in any One Day International Match, Twenty20 International Match or any other International Match of fifty (50) or twenty (20) overs per side, is more than two overs short of the Minimum Over Rate, such an offence shall be considered a ‘Serious Over Rate Offence’.
-
Now,
Day 1 there were 2 referrals. And 4 wickets fell - Extra playing time 6 mins
Day 2 there were 3 referrals. And 7 wickets fell - Extra playing time 19 mins
Day 3 there were 2 referrals. And 10 wickets fell. Extra playing time 18 mins
Day 4 there were 3 referrals. And 7 wickets fell Extra playing time 15 mins
Day 5 there were 4 referrals And 8 wickets fell. Extra playing time 47 mins.
Based on the above, there was a serious over rate problem on the part of the South Africans on Day 5. Which, by the defination laid down by the ICC, translates to a ‘Serious Over Rate Offence’
Which in turn means, "A captain guilty of a Serious Over Rate Offence is sanctioned "The imposition of two (2) Suspension Points."
So will my Christmas wish come true? Will Graeme Smith join MS Dhoni in cooling their heels as their teams play?
The ball then, is in Roshan Mahanama's court.
MS Dhoni banned for two ODIs
And a fair call. India took 4 hours and 3 minutes to complete their overs. Even factoring for the injury breaks,ball change and drinks breaks, India were atleast 25 minutes behind schedule.
Per the ICC CODE OF CONDUCT FOR PLAYERS AND PLAYER SUPPORT PERSONNEL, a captain guilty of a Serious Over Rate Offence is sanctioned "The imposition of two (2) Suspension Points."
Per the ICC
Suspension Points. The weighting points used to determine the period of suspension imposed against any Player or Player Support Personnel pursuant to Article 7 of the Code of Conduct.
and
where the actual over rate in any Test Match or any other International Match of at least four days in duration is more than five overs short of the Minimum Over Rate, or, in any One Day International Match, Twenty20 International Match or any other International Match of fifty (50) or twenty (20) overs per side, is more than two overs short of the Minimum Over Rate, such an offence shall be considered a ‘Serious Over Rate Offence’.
As India was clearly on the wrong side of that particular line, Dhoni's suspension is warranted.
saffari test series preview... and other grievous matters...
though the series is labeled as south africa vs england test series, i have my doubts...
the series basically is south africa's domestic competition which has been accorded international status...
south africa 'a' and 'b' sides will play each other for four 'test' matches with a dash of foreigners in the form of england players thrown in to make this domestic competition interesting and appealing...
this is the trick played by south african cricministrators to make south africa the top test cricket nation... coz whoever wins... it will be hailed as the win of one south african team over another...
icc against its nature is said to be acting fast over this matter which has the potential of south africa taking over the cricketing world if not intervened timely... so they have proposed a restriction of maximum three south african players per test side on the lines of IPL which restricts franchisees to have not more than four foreigners in their teams... to promote 'local' players...
needless to say the proposal is due to be passed by all respective boards in the first meeting itself which will take place in lalit modi's swanky office for obvious reasons...
watch this space for further developments...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
