Monday, 21 August 2006

The farce at the Oval

I am guessing that everyone in the cricket world has heard what happened at the Oval last night, but if you didn't here is the Guardian's ball by ball coverage as the "action" (or lack of it) unfolded.

And what an absolute surprise it is to find that Darrell Hair is at the centre of things. I still haven't forgiven the pompous git for his terrible pro-Australian bias back in the days before neutral umpires. And I am still amazed that he was allowed to umpire after not only no-balling Muttiah Muralitharan, but then writing a book to cash in on the controversey.

6 comments:

Stuart Helwig said...

Don't forget though, he was right! Murali was chucking! Maybe he was right here too? You can't criticise a guy for being right? Controversial maybe, but maybe he's just got the guts to do what the others don't - God knows there are some terribly weak umpires going around at the moment, and the Pakis do have a reputation for this...

Ben said...

I was of the understanding that Murali was vindicated. And there was a lot to be suspicious of in Hair's actions in that test.

But maybe he was right and maybe he was right about all those lbws he awarded against touring players. And maybe he was right about Pakistan doctoring the ball in this test. However, it does seem that he was wrong in deciding that the Pakistanis were refusing to play. At one point they were standing on the ground waiting for the umpires. So surely he was wrong to judge that they had forfeited.

Anonymous said...

funny how everything boils down to an "Anyone But Oz" attitude these days. winner have to cop it, its one of those basic rules in human behavior i guess. and i agree- umpires today need to show courage and need to be backed when they show it.

but I wish Hair had shown the smarts and subtlety to have the cameras track the goings-on and made a decision at a tea break or some suitable stoppage time instead of right in the middle of an over. very neanderthal, that.
if his suspicions were found just, then things would've been easier to control in a hush-hush manner.

face it, no one can take the accusation of cheating lying down.

Stuart Helwig said...

Murali was only vindicated once they changed the rules to make 15 degrees, "not a throw".

The Pakistanis were only standing on the field, once it became evident that their "protest actions" may have backfired a little. When the umpires were on the field, one of their players was reading the newspaper on the balcony. Too little, too late...

...and on the lbw's thing, even 2 summers ago in NZ(04/05), NZ were robbed blind in the LBW stakes. They suffered about 4 times as many positive decisions, and were not awarded a very telling decision against Langer early on, so you can rightly feel harshly done by on that count, but again, Darryl Hair was nowhere to be seen. Maybe it's more than just one man...Although he was umpiring in the Aus vs NZ test at the WACA, when he neglected to call the no-ball that would've seen Warney notch up his first Test Ton - hmmmm maybe you're on to something...

Anonymous said...

the chucking rule was changed because icc found fast bowlers like mcgrath, lee chucked as well

Stuart Helwig said...

McGrath - come on!!

Lee, yeh probably, Shoaib Akhtar definetly and one or two West Indies, but Glenn McGrath, seriously - you've just knocked one of the best bowling actions in the world.