Our shared values deserve better than a pointless term like ‘spirit of cricket’

The culture of English cricket is but one concept of morality – no person, and certainly no country, has a monopoly on virtue writes Jonathan Liew in The Guardian


So let’s talk about Nepal v Ireland in the Oman Quadrangular Twenty20 series last year. Ireland are 114 for eight in the 19th over when the ball is hit towards mid-on. The Oman bowler Kamal Singh lunges at it in his follow-through. At the same time the Ireland non-striker, Andy McBrine, tries to scamper through for a single. The pair collide. McBrine falls over. Singh keeps his balance, and tosses the ball to the wicketkeeper Aasif Sheikh, with the batter still sprawled on the turf, miles out of his ground.

The laws of cricket have nothing to say on situations such as this. Neither player is deliberately obstructing the other; neither player can avoid the collision without giving up a significant sporting advantage. Sheikh is perfectly at liberty to complete the run-out. But he does not. He holds on to the ball and lets McBrine complete the single, an act of sporting goodwill that will later earn him the International Cricket Council’s Spirit of Cricket award.

Yes, here we go again: a think-piece about the current Ashes series that has very little to do with the current Ashes series. One of the reasons the dismissal of Jonny Bairstow by Alex Carey on Sunday has created so much noise is because it is one of those issues where no expertise whatsoever is required to express an opinion. Anyone can participate in this game: Rishi Sunak, Sue off Twitter, Jeremy Vine, your best mate who doesn’t really know anything about cricket but thinks Josh Tongue is a funny name. Let’s fulminate. Let’s pontificate. Let’s play.

 

At which point we run into the minor inconvenience of Law 20.1.2, which is basically unequivocal on the point that Bairstow was out. Nobody really seems to dispute this, or even have a workable alternative to the law as it stands. What, then, is everyone arguing about? Ultimately, it comes down to ownership and territory and narrative and culture: who gets to define cricket, and in whose benefit they do so. And thus it is again – with deepest apologies – necessary once again to discuss Bazball.

There is a common thread running through England’s new vibes-based style of cricket and the piqued outrage that has greeted Bairstow’s stumping. Both, ultimately, are grounded in an idea of impunity and presumption: an assertion that England and England alone gets to adjudicate on what is good for the game. We get to say what constitutes entertainment. We get to decide how Test cricket must be saved. And, by extension, we get to judge what is sporting and fair, the norms of behaviour that our opponents will be expected to follow. You can keep your silly rules. We stand for more.

Of course, England is by no means alone in its sense of exceptionalism. Australia has long declared itself the moral arbiter of where “the line” stands in terms of sledging. India creates most of the sport’s revenue, and before long it will probably conclude that it should be creating most of the sport’s morality as well. The through-line here is power: the power to generate headlines, to set an agenda, to establish norms and impose them on others. In a sport as ritualistic as cricket, governed as much by tacit understandings and shared assumptions as written laws, this kind of soft power allows those with a platform to build an ethical framework around their own values and priorities.

 

Is it outlandish to posit that the reason Bairstow strayed out of his ground was because he had internalised a mindset in which rules were optional and the vibe was the thing? Feels like the end of the over? Hell, assume it probably is. The dismissal felt wrong to me, and it may well have felt wrong to you too. But then we have all been steeped in the culture of English cricket, with all its inherent flaws and biases and blind spots. It is but one concept of sporting morality, and it is probably about time we recognised there were others.

The real shame here is that so much of the discourse either falls along tribal lines or is couched in pointless terms such as “spirit of cricket”. Perhaps we need an alternative vocabulary here: what is unsatisfyingly described as the “spirit of cricket” is so often just a kind of basic empathy, a politeness, a willingness to treat others as one would wish to be treated. There is common ground to be found here, a recognition that there are parts of every sport that rules cannot delineate, because humans are complex and life is messy and the best sports express the very fullest of both. 

Let Carey be judged on his own free will, just as Sheikh was when he refused to rugn out McBrine. But you will also need to know that after Ireland’s reprieve McBrine hit the next ball for six, the last two wickets put on 13 runs and Ireland won a tight low-scoring game. Sheikh’s conscience may have been clear. But his team probably ended up bottom of the table as a result. “It would have been unfair to the opponent,” he said later. “We wouldn’t be pleased if our team had got the wicket in that manner, since it would be against our culture.”

Let us have a conversation about what cricket’s shared values should really be, and let those with the smallest platforms speak first. Let us recognise that no person, and certainly no country, has a monopoly on virtue. Let us fulminate. Let us pontificate. This is, after all, everyone’s game, and everyone can play.

‘Same old Aussies, always cheating!’ Chants cut deep for a nation still scarred by sandpaper

It was shocking to watch a baying crowd at Lord’s hurl abuse at players for effecting a stumping within the laws of the game writes Megan Maurice in The Guardian

In most sports, players simply follow the rules laid out for them, which are enforced by umpires or referees. If they break a rule, a consequence is applied and play resumes. There are times, naturally, when athletes are accused of being unsporting, but there is rarely a drawn-out debate over players following the rules exactly as written and being scolded for doing so.

Cricket is a very different beast in many ways. No more clearly did we see this play out than on day five of the second Ashes Test. Where the two cricketing nations of England and Australia are concerned, history is a living and hotly contested document, one that is constantly being grappled over and argued about. So as soon as Jonny Bairstow was stumped by Alex Carey and the third umpire sent him on his way, battle lines were drawn between Australian fans staking out their ground on the side of a “fair and legal dismissal” and the English abandoning their Sunday lunch plans to fight for “the spirit of cricket”. 

For those Australians, the incident cut deep. The scars of sandpaper-gate are still visible. Memories are fresh of cricket heroes crying on international television, the prime minister indicting it as a “shocking disappointment” and Australian cricket being brought into disrepute. It all sits just below the surface. Yet as difficult as it was, most Australian fans took the criticism on the chin; they were equally disappointed with the team and prepared for the onslaught of derision.

However, this is a new era of the Australian men’s cricket team. The biggest criticism most people can make of captain Pat Cummins is that he cares too deeply about social issues. Coach Andrew McDonald seems satisfied to work in the background, rather than front the media. The team has rehabilitated its image considerably over the last five years.

So it was painful for the scars to be ripped open so forcefully and painfully as boos rang out around Lord’s, followed by cries of “Aussie! Aussie! Aussie! Cheat! Cheat! Cheat!” and “Same old Aussies, always cheating!”

Then there was the abuse of players as they walked through the Long Room to lunch, which was perhaps even more galling considering the waiting list of approximately 29 years and £500 ($955 AUD) annual membership fee paid to be part of this exclusive club.

 


With history simmering under the surface, it was shocking to watch the baying crowd hurl abuse at the touring players – not for breaking a key law of the game around attempting to alter the condition of the ball – but for their keeper throwing the ball at the stumps and effecting a stumping within the laws of the game.

Once the immediate injustice of the situation settled down, responses have mostly been tinged with bemusement. Most people can name a similar incident that occurred in club or junior cricket, with an unsuspecting batter, who did not quite have a grasp on what a crease was or the importance of staying in one while batting, caught out by a more wily wicketkeeper.  

Many Australians have been quick to point out the hypocrisy of the uproar from England – with incidents from Bairstow’s shy at the stumps of Marnus Labuschagne the day before, to his similar dismissal of New Zealand’s Colin de Grandhomme in a 2022 Test match, to current England coach Brendon McCullum’s dismissal of Sri Lanka’s Muttiah Muralitharan while the latter was celebrating the century of teammate Kumar Sangakkara.

The mood of the nation was neatly summed up by cricket writer Dan Liebke who noted: “Always very interesting to me how the spirit of cricket seems to revolve around England batters being allowed to bat on even when they’re out.”

Between the jokes, there is a genuine confusion about what the “spirit of cricket” entails and when it is applied. These debates usually crop up whenever a Mankad is effected, but to have widened the field to include stumpings makes things even more complicated. For Australian fans, it was one thing to face up to the accusation of cheating when it was true, but quite another when it occurred in this murky, grey area between the rules and the mysterious “spirit of the game” – an area for which England, at least, seem to hold a map.

The Supreme Court's Expert Panel on Adani-Hindenburg

 

Why Ashwin was right and Dhoni wrong

You're all out of strikes: there's nothing in the Laws that suggests it's a bowler's duty to warn an offending non-striker before running him out writes Simon Taufel in Cricinfo 

The main talking points in an IPL often have to do with the performance of match officials, decisions being challenged, player conduct, and matches finishing well beyond the scheduled time. This season, umpires have come under increased public scrutiny due to a couple of incidents that made instant headlines and continue to make for heated debate.

R Ashwin's run-out of Jos Buttler early on in the season was fiercely discussed by all stakeholders and commentators. Ashwin said it was instinctive. Buttler said it left a sour taste. The MCC, the custodians of cricket's laws, said the Indian player was hurting the spirit of cricket, and that his actions were deliberate.

A few weeks later, another senior Indian player, in fact one of the most venerated, MS Dhoni, charged into the middle to challenge a no-ball call that seemed to be called and then revoked by the on-field umpires. Dhoni subsequently pleaded guilty to the charge and copped a fine.

Let us look at both incidents to try and understand the role of the umpires and the players involved, and who was right or wrong.

Ashwin's Buttler run-out had nothing to do with spirit of cricket

I was in India when the incident happened and I saw it on TV. Subsequently we had an MCC Laws sub-committee meeting and discussed the event. Also present on that call was Geoff Allardice, the ICC's General Manager of cricket, given that a World Cup is just around the corner.

My view on this particular issue is, it has nothing to do with the spirit of cricket. During our discussion, we spoke at length about Law 41.16. The intent of the law is that the non-striker should not leave their ground at the bowler's end before the ball is delivered. This is why the ICC has stipulated within their regulations and interpretations that the bowler can dismiss the non-striker run out up until the bowler's arm reaches the top of the delivery swing.

What I did say to the MCC was that maybe we could help people understand that this incident had nothing to do with the spirit of cricket but rather everything to do with the run-out rule (which is Law 38) by repositioning this clause about unfair advantage under that Law in future.

At Lord's in 2011 I sat on an ICC Cricket Committee meeting, across the table from Tim May, then the players' representative on the panel. May strongly advocated that he wanted to see this type of situation be under the purview of the rules governing run-out dismissals. The committee debated that at length and it was decided to tweak the ICC playing conditions so that it was no longer the back-foot landing that was regarded as the point of no-return in such cases but rather the point of normal release, which is when the bowler gets to the top of their delivery swing. As a result, the bowler would have a lot more opportunity to run out the non-striker. The representatives of the players were in favour of this type of run-out if the non-striker was backing up too far (intentionally or not).

I go back to the intent of Law 41.16, which is to ensure the non-striker stays in the crease until the moment of release. If the non-striker does not do that, he or she is breaching the Law. It is he or she who is gaining an unfair advantage.

All Ashwin did was appeal to the umpire for a run-out dismissal. He stopped short of delivering the ball and did not go through with his delivery swing. For him to be subject to adverse commentary that amounted to character assassination regarding his supposed contravention of the spirit of the game, is incredibly unfair in the way the Laws are written and the way they are to be applied.

Both the on-field umpire and the third umpire did not feel he deceived the non-striker by waiting too long before breaking the stumps within dealing with the appeal - the ball was deemed by them to be still within play.

Several years ago, before answering these kinds of run-out appeals, as umpires we checked with the fielding captain whether they wanted to continue with the appeal first. Around 2011, the captains collectively expressed misgivings about this process, saying they did not want pressure to be put on them about whether to continue with an appeal or not. As a collective, they asked the umpires to simply answer the appeal if one was made.

ALSO READ: Monga: The spirit of cricket is no substitute for the Laws

People also accused Ashwin of premeditation. My response to that would be: well, so what? Bowlers attempt to get batsmen out lbw, bowled, caught, or by any other form of dismissal. Aren't all these premeditated? So I don't see how that is a relevant argument at all.

I also found it interesting that many pundits and players have spoken about how Ashwin should have given Buttler a warning. Giving a warning is a myth; there is nothing in the Laws about it. Given that the ICC Cricket Committee and the MCC have made it clear how they want the game to be played, why is such a warning required? If the non-striker does not want to be run out at the bowler's end backing up, then they must stay in their ground until the ball leaves the bowler's hand.

From an umpire's perspective, it is a situation that is almost impossible to manage on their own, which is probably why the Buttler run-out was referred to the third umpire. It is interesting that it was referred, given that the on-field umpire didn't necessarily think the ball was dead, and at no stage did Ashwin actually get to the point of vertical delivery. It is subjective as to whether or not he actually got to the normal point of release. So it is very understandable that Buttler was given out run out.

There are several challenges in a situation like this for an umpire. It is an incredibly difficult Law (41.16) to enforce at the bowler's end. The umpire's challenge is to watch the back foot and/or the front foot, the point of normal release, the ball coming into view, and whether the non-striker is backing up. And then answer the run-out appeal, making a decision about whether or not the batsman was in their ground or short when the stumps were put down. You can imagine how difficult that would be because you can't watch everything at the same time. It is a very challenging and somewhat impractical law for an umpire to judge, especially without the support of a third umpire.The umpires should have avoided engaging with MS Dhoni when he walked on to the field to protest the call BCCI

I believe good umpiring should be proactive. You solve problems before they happen. Personally, if I see a batsman backing up too far, I ask them to come back. If I see a bowler who is getting too close with back foot or front foot, I will tell them they are getting close, and if they continue to do this, it is likely a no-ball will be called. If I see a fielder who is getting pretty close to infringing the fielding restrictions, I would remind them to be in the right position, otherwise a no-ball call is likely. Good umpiring is about maintaining a policy of no surprises and keeping the focus on cricket. That was my style, but the game has moved on a little bit since I have retired.

I was in India and spoke to Ashwin soon after the incident. I reaffirmed to him that it was unfair and not appropriate for various people to pull him up for breaching the spirit of cricket. I made contact with him to make sure he was fine and not affected by the comments, and to support him on a human level. I told him he was within his rights to appeal and to attempt to run out the non-striker.


Dhoni crossed the line

My first reaction at the incident of Dhoni going on to the field to talk to the umpires was that of surprise because one of Dhoni's great strengths that I have seen over the years is his composure and his ability to handle adversity or difficult moments with a high degree of acceptance, to consider his options and then act in a measured, controlled way.

I get that these are high-pressure moments - lots of things are riding on these games, a lot of money is involved, and there is a lot of excitement and passion within the ground and outside it. I do understand this environment, having had first-hand experience officiating in many IPL finals.

But non-participating players or even coaches and managers entering the field of play to approach an umpire is not right. MS acknowledged this by accepting and pleading guilty to the charge imposed by the IPL match officials.

I would have preferred personally that the umpires did not even talk to him, and instead asked him to go away and not involved themselves in a discussion with him at the time. It is important that umpires don't let themselves be surrounded by players, and that they make their decisions without any perception of being influenced.

ALSO READ: IPL's soft signal on Dhoni is a chance put down

From what I observed, MS seemed to be pointing out that the umpire at the bowler's end had raised his arm to signal a no-ball and he later went back on that call. Now, the primacy of the call belongs to the umpire at the bowler's end. As a point of protocol, you do look at your colleague at square leg to help judge accurately the height of waist-high full tosses and bouncers above head height, before calling them.

While the square-leg umpire can raise their arm to signal a wide or a no-ball to their colleague, they are not calling it. Let us be very clear: it is the jurisdiction of the bowler's-end umpire, with support from the square-leg umpire.

In this particular case the no-ball was signalled by the bowler's-end umpire, who stuck his arm out without waiting to confirm the height judgement with his colleague at square leg. And the square-leg umpire himself had not signalled a no-ball. So the bowler's-end umpire perhaps second-guessed himself and (then) decided to retract or discontinue the no-ball call process. He did not revoke his original call, which was for a no-ball. Had he done so, it might have avoided some of the confusion.

Adding to the confusion, the stadium announcer signalled a free hit on the big screen, which obviously left the players further unsure as to what the situation was.

I would have much preferred to have seen the umpire at the bowler's end back himself and be confident with his original call, because from the officiating perspective, normally your first call or gut instinct is the right one. The replays I have seen seem to support the original call in this case.

Be that as it may, there is no reason for the batting captain to come onto the field and contest the decision or seek clarification while the match is in progress. In this case, Dhoni did cross the line.


The unrealistic expectations placed on umpires

High-quality camera work, technological advances in television broadcasting, and the presence of several commentators at each match have allowed TV audiences as well as fans at the ground to get closer to the action. The fans are now being provided a lot more information on the game than in the past. The heightened involvement of the broadcasters and the media in matches means there is more to be shown, more stories to be told, and more to be scrutinised.

Our game is perfectly imperfect. By that I mean that technology does not solve all of our problems. It is almost replacing one set of problems on the field with another. When you add a new element to the game, such as third-umpire technology, while that might seem to solve a couple of problems, it also creates a whole list of other challenges, involving training, consistency, and accuracy of match officials.

ALSO READ: How simple is spotting a no-ball?

Technology is not perfect. Hot Spot doesn't always show a mark. Real-time Snickometer or Ultra Edge don't always show a spike. Ball tracking has an in-built margin of error. The white ball doesn't stay white. The white line of the crease gets scuffed away where the bowlers' feet land.

Even when we have up to four umpires involved in a match - two on-field, a third, and a reserve on the boundary - they all don't necessarily seem to make the same decisions for the same reasons, or they may not always initially agree on one course of action. It is part of the beauty of sport.

But the best in the world make the fewest mistakes. Still, even the best umpire in the world will not have a great performance every day. You have to bear in mind that it is the human aspect that we need to remind ourselves of here.

People expect umpires to be perfect and somehow get better. That is an unrealistic expectation. Umpires cannot be perfect, but they can be excellent. We need to be a little more accepting, and appreciate that everyone is doing their best.

The Shashank Redemption - Why not make administrators our role models?

ROB STEEN in Cricinfo

By putting a stop to the brief reign of the Big Three, Shashank Manohar has managed to do something that defied criticism © Getty Images


I simply couldn't believe all the filth which came out of their mouths. All day long. And to anyone. It was hilarious but unrepeatable, and because I wanted them to treat me as one of the lads, I accepted it.

You really know how to control a match buddy. It's a f***ing joke.

Two snapshots of sport in 2016, both from Australia, the nation that, some might say, put the "tit" in competitive.

That first reverberant sound bite emerged last week from England wicketkeeper Sarah Taylor, semi-fondly reminiscing about her recent experiences as the first woman to play the highest grade of male club cricket for Northern Districts in Adelaide. Somewhat unsurprisingly, she discovered that her ears and sensibilities were not going to be spared. As Bryan Ferry so eloquently put it, "Boys will be boys will be boys-yoy-yoys…"

The second, decidedly unsound bite came during last month's Australian Open, when that gifted but very naughty overhead smasher Nick Kyrgios hit fresh heights in his impressive assault on John McEnroe's all-time record for sporting officials harangued, abused and ridiculed. Indeed, at the end of the match in question, Kyrgios approached James Keothavong, the latest object of his loathing, and told the British umpire he was "a terrible referee", thus achieving the notable double of being at once searingly honest and hopelessly wrong.

What distinguishes the verbals encountered by Taylor from those delivered by Kyrgios, of course, is that the former occurred during a match that was not covered by the all-seeing, almost-all-hearing broadcasters. What further unites them is that the rules of the respective games, at amateur and professional level alike, empower the enforcers to penalise the offensive offenders. It is in the now-histrionic court of public approval that things get messy.

Naturally, there are those - almost invariably the sort of folk who claim to have first-hand memories of the '60s but were already too old to join in the fun - who will assure you that bad behaviour during a sporting contest is a strictly late-20th-century curse, triggered by the advent of unseemly rewards and the TV-fuelled obsession with personalities and controversy. This is, of course, absolute rot.

For no justifiable reason, playing sport for a living - unlike acting or singing or dancing or painting - means not only having to behave yourself, but being seen to behave yourself.

Ask Colin McDonald. Roused by Mike Atherton's recent contention that Fred Trueman and Brian Statham were England's No. 1 all-time co-manipulators of the new cherry, the dogged former Australia opener recently reflected on the might of Frank "Typhoon" Tyson: "I will never forget the remarks made by my opening partner Jim Burke during the 1959 Adelaide Test after a Tyson bouncer: 'If you bowl another one of those I'll knock your block off with this bat.' 'Will yer?' replied Frank. Not wishing to enjoy being the recipient of a similar delivery, my pleasant rejoinder to Tyson on his way back to his mark was 'Well bowled.'"

In emailing those wincing reminiscences to the Times, McDonald perhaps unwittingly highlighted the preposterousness of what might best be termed the sporting contract - that timeless unwritten constitution that obliges professional sportsfolk to seek victory at any cost but behave like a pre-pubescent Mormon; the same unwritten constitution that simultaneously obliges our competitive artists to remember, above all, that it's only a blimmin' game.

For those who regard ungentlemanly conduct as perpetually indefensible, last week's Under-19 World Cup game between West Indies and Zimbabwe in Chittagong proffered much to get high and mighty about. With one over remaining and the Zimbabweans requiring a further three runs, Richard Ngarava was "mankaded" by Keemo Paul, sending waves of disgust rippling around the planet.

Indeed, it says all too much about cricket's self-deluding self-image that a photograph of the incident made its way onto the English sports pages even though not one of Blighty's nine national daily papers sent a correspondent to the tournament - thus missing the lethally precocious magnificence of Alzarri Shaheim Joseph, a skyscraping Antiguan beanpole who seems destined to put Kemar Roach and Jerome Taylor to shame by becoming the millennium's first great lean, mean Caribbean pace machine.

In principle, this column agrees wholeheartedly with Tony Cozier: the notion of being honour-bound to deliver a pre-emptive warning is more than a little stupefying. For one thing, it's not as if we expect batsmen to stick their hand up and inform the bowler they're about to suddenly take guard the other way round. For another, baseball, cricket's uppity younger brother, has always been more clear-cut: if a runner is caught straying off base while sneakily seeking a head start, he's out and that's it. No ethical posturing or accusations of moral bankruptcy here. In fact, such dismissals are so common they have their own incriminating name: "picked off".



If Ched Evans wins his appeal and is re-signed by Sheffield United, will he be greeted with apologies? © Getty Images


Should we be perturbed that teenagers such as Paul appear to be every bit as prepared as their elders and alleged betters to seek any legitimate advantage available rather than concern themselves with something so nebulous as "the spirit" of the game? The opposite conclusion should be drawn: their priority is to demonstrate that they are capable of making the leap from outstanding amateurs to - at the very least - competent professionals.

For no justifiable reason, playing sport for a living - unlike acting or singing or dancing or painting - means not only having to behave yourself, but being seen to behave yourself. On and off the park. Why rugby flankers or NFL tight ends - whose job is to disrupt the opposition by virtually any means necessary - should be expected to be angels beyond the touchline is utterly beyond this column's ken. Since successful athletes tend to peak in their late 20s, all this column can say is that when it was that age, it was about as mature as day-old cheddar. Then there are the stresses and strains of doing one's job in public, unaided by an editor or body double, never mind in the incessant glare of the octopus otherwise known as the media. Shouldn't compassion be more prevalent than self-righteous, hypocritical indignation?

This is not to say there are not intensely problematic cases. Nor decry the many Sheffield United FC fans - among them the Olympic heptathlon champion Jessica Ennis-Hill, whose name was removed from a stand at Bramall Lane after she, along with many others, threatened to end their loyalty should the club re-sign the convicted rapist Ched Evans. Nor fault Atlanta Falcons for releasing Michael Vick in 2009 after the quarterback had spent 21 months in jail for running a dogfighting ring. Vick, though, rediscovered his mojo by kind permission of the Philadelphia Eagles. As for Evans, who has always maintained his innocence, his case has been referred to the Court of Appeal. What happens if the verdict is reversed? Would United re-sign him? Would (anti) social media resound with apologies?

"I'm not paid to be a role model. I'm paid to wreak havoc on the basketball court." Thus, in a largely forgotten 1993 commercial, stated the NBA star Charles Barkley, hitting the nail squarely on the head. "Funny how big shots accept all the trappings of role model-dom - especially the residual commercial cash - before they renounce their broader responsibilities to society," retorted Phil Mushnick in the New York Post. Meanwhile, in Sports Illustrated, Barkley's fellow NBA alumnus Karl Malone jabbed hard: "Charles... I don't think it's your decision to make. We don't choose to be role models, we are chosen. Our only choice is whether to be a good role model or a bad one."

Begging to differ was the Boston College sociologist Michael Malec, former editor of theJournal of Sport and Social Issues. "In essence Barkley is correct. If you want to emulate what he does on court, you've got a wonderful model there. That doesn't necessarily mean he ought to be a model as a father or husband."

Time, then, for a radical rethink: if we really must have role models, should we not look to the administrators, the purported adults? Plainly, suggesting even a tiny proportion fit the bill is tantamount to proposing that the next best option is Robert Mugabe (the current No. 1 global dictator, according to Forbes magazine, just ahead of Bashar al-Assad). Fishing a good guy out of the alphabet soup containing such toxic ingredients as the ICC, IOC, IAAF and FIFA, is akin to locating a needle in the Pacific Ocean.

Tim Wigmore was spot on when he pointed out that, before India - with a little help from their equally greedy, yellow-bellied pals in Australia and England - started muscle-flexing in earnest, the ICC was scarcely a model of enlightened governance. On the other hand, quoting the questionable wit and dubious wisdom of Rahm Emanuel, Barack Obama's former chief of staff ("Never let a serious crisis go to waste") was perhaps not the wisest choice.

Emanuel, after all, "seems committed", attested that zealous American scourge of bad sports Dave Zirin, "to win the current spirited competition as the most loathsome person in American political life". As mayor of Chicago, Emanuel demonstrated how the profits generated by spectator sport can distort social values. Having overseen the closure of 54 schools and six mental-health clinics under the justification of a "budgetary crisis", he handed over $100 million-plus to DePaul University for a new basketball arena.

What, then, of Shashank Manohar? In terminating the mercifully brief reign of the "Big Three" with suitable prejudice, he should be feted as the first major sporting administrator in recent memory to do something that defied criticism. Nonetheless, there are no fewer than three Ranji Trophy sides in his own state. As reader Jose P observed in a comment: "The diversity, and complexity of the well-entrenched multiple power centres within the BCCI structure, is a thousand gordian knots knotted into a more complex humongous knot."

Still, let's be generous and optimistic out there: anyone for the Shashank redemption?

Declare a No Ball when a batsman attempts an early run

Girish Menon from CamKerala CC

David Hopps in his piece, 'Is the game going to the dogs' suggests that Stuart Broad in the forthcoming World T20 should without warning 'mankad' Kohli and Raina off successive balls. This is his way of reminding us of the role of convention and civilised behaviour in cricket and he implies that in its absence anarchy would prevail.

So, I decided to look up the meaning of convention on the omniscient Google and found that one of the meanings of convention is 'a way in which something is done'. I think it is this definition of convention that Hopps uses to criticise Keemo Paul for mankading Richard Ngarava in the U19 World Cup.

----Other pieces by the author

Sreesanth - Another modern day Valmiki?

To Beef or not to Beef - A Personal View on the Beef Crisis in India

On Walking - Advice for a Fifteen Year Old

----

I then asked myself what would be at the other end of the spectrum of convention and I felt the term 'creativity' would fit the bill. Google defines creativity as ' the use of imagination or original ideas to create something'.  When Keemo's act is examined from this perspective it is a creative act, not illegal, and an imaginative way to reach the objectives of his task.

In the history of the world, not just cricket, whenever any creative solution is implemented, affected governments would debate and proscribe such activity if it was not in the 'public' interest. In the case of 'mankading' such an inquiry has been conducted by the ICC and the act has still been deemed legal, hence the furore baffles me.

Hopps felt that it was newcomers who failed fail to honour cricket's conventions. So I asked myself, two questions:

'Is it newcomers to cricket who disrespect its conventions'?

and

 'Are conventions in the best interests of all participants?'

In the case of Keemo Paul, yes he is definitely a newcomer to cricket, so probably was the original sinner Vinoo Mankad and the other mankaders in between. I suppose these guys may have read about the laws of cricket and how the umpire's decision should not be questioned. As they plotted to get the opposing batsmen out, a difficult task at the best of times, they may have noticed this anomaly between the law and its actual practice. Being young and innocent they may have focussed on their objectives and failed to realise the opprobrium that will befall them if they challenged cricket's archaic anomalies.

So who makes conventions? A historical examination of societies will reveal that conventions and practices evolve out of the systems devised by the powerful. A history of cricket also reveals that it's rules and conventions were determined by upper class batsmen epitomised by the roguish W G Grace. The bowlers were the proverbial servants meant to exist for the pleasure of batsmen. It is these servants, like the erstwhile British colonies, who now challenge the prevalent conventions albeit legally in the case of the mankaders.

Hopps then gives an example of queue jumping to illustrate the catastrophe that will befall mankind if any convention is broken. Yes, the effects of queue jumping has created havoc in India and probably other erstwhile British colonies. Yet, as any economics student will tell you the problem with a queue is that it does not ration a scarce resource based on greatest need. If the A&E departments of NHS hospitals worked on the convention of queues then a Friday night over-reveller would have priority over a critical patient and an ambulance would be perennially stuck in traffic.



© PA Photos

Returning to mankading, I believe that cricket's current convention enable non striking batsmen to cheat wilfully throughout an innings and it is time for conventions keep in tandem with the laws of the game? I actually even have a solution for the mankading problem. Declare a no ball* and penalise the batting side every time a non striker steps out of the crease illegally. This could be done by the third umpire while the on field umpire focuses on the bowler's actions.



* This no ball means a one run penalty and a ball reduced from the batting side's quota.

The spirit's in the laws

Joe Yates in Cricinfo

Spirit of Cricket? - Laws be damned!

Once again, following Ben Stokes' obstructing-the-field dismissal in an ODI at Lord's, the spirit of cricket debate reared its ugly and pretentious head. Ugly because there is a general lack of consensus on what the spirit of cricket actually is and pretentious because of what certain players, past and present, contributed to the discussion. One player said, 'I would have withdrawn the appeal.' Another said, 'we wouldn't have appealed in the first place.'

Really? The self-righteousness is nauseating!

First, let's deal with the basics. Ben Stokes intercepted a ball with his hand that was seemingly headed for the stumps with him well out of his ground. Under the laws, this action was grounds for an appeal, which the Australians rightfully did. The only question now was intent, which was for the umpires to decide. Upon consideration of the available evidence, the umpires concluded that, under law 37, Stokes had indeed obstructed the field and gave him out.

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So where exactly does the spirit of cricket come into this?

The only real way to settle this tediously endless debate on the spirit of cricket is to fall back to the MCC's preamble to the laws of cricket. The essence of this preamble is thus: The captain is responsible for the conduct of his players; all players must play fair; the umpires are the sole arbiters of what is fair; you must respect the opposition, your captain, the umpires, and the game's traditional values (whatever they are in this rapidly evolving age of protective equipment, cameras, microphones and DRS).

The problem comes when someone says something like this: "That may have been within the laws of the game, but it wasn't within its spirit."

Come again? How is that possible? Is this to suggest that the spirit of cricket is independent of, or even contrary to, its laws? Never may that happen!

The spirit of cricket is guided by principles - principles of fair play and honourable conduct. It has much less to do with how a batsman is dismissed. Violations of the spirit of cricket, such as ball-tampering, time-wasting, aggressive or dishonest appealing, and dissent are not dealt with by the umpires on the field as much as they are by the match referee after the game. Although even these offences can be handled on field by the umpires under Law 42, which legislates specifically for fair or unfair play.

So the only way to invoke the spirit of cricket in Ben Stokes' dismissal is in the validity of the appeal. Since there was deemed sufficient evidence to give him out, there was clearly enough evidence for an appeal. Ergo, spirit of cricket intact.

The spirit of cricket debate invariably surfaces when there is an unusual or rare dismissal, such as obstructing the field or running out the non-striker, a.k.a. mankading. Strong opinions were voiced when Ravi Ashwin mankaded Lahiru Thirimanne but the appeal was withdrawn 'in the interests of the spirit of cricket.'

Many believe that when a batsman backs up too far, he is gaining an unfair advantage. An advantage, certainly, but why is it unfair? It would only be unfair if the fielding side could do nothing about it. There is absolutely nothing in the laws of cricket stating that a batsman cannot leave his crease before the bowler bowls. There is a law (Law 38), however, that states that if a batsman is out of his crease when the ball is in play, which it is when the bowler starts his run-up (Law 22), he can be run out. Simple. Elegant. Balanced.

It is the same with obstructing the field. There is nothing in the laws of cricket stating that a batsman cannot interfere with the fielding side. However, there is a law that states that if he does, he can be given out. Where the most harm comes to the game of cricket is when the laws are flouted or ignored in favour of this intangible and mysterious spirit. The spirit of cricket is harmed when fielding teams are forced to think twice before raising a legitimate appeal or running out a batsman who is out of his crease when the ball is live.

The spirit of cricket was damaged far more when Steven Smith's integrity and maturity were called into question by not withdrawing the appeal than by the appeal itself. Where was the respect for the opponents or the umpires there?

Cricket is an invented sport. Like all sports, cricket has rules, or in cricket's case, Laws. If there is a law whose existence or application is widely seen to be against the interests, or spirit, of the game, then change or abolish that law. But we all know that is not going to happen. The laws of cricket have been developed and refined over many decades across three centuries - and are very clear.

The spirit of cricket should not and cannot exist separately from the laws of cricket. It is contained within its laws. Anyone who feels differently should either start a rigorous campaign to get the laws changed, or rethink what they consider to be in the game's spirit. And it most certainly should not be considered against the spirit of the game if the laws are correctly applied.

Knowing, accepting and playing within these Laws IS the Spirit of Cricket.

The incredibly malleable spirit of cricket

Ed Smith in Cricinfo

	Ian Bell was out in the Trent Bridge Test against India in 2011... until he wasn't © PA Photos  Enlarge

Two British satirists, the late John Fortune and John Bird, mastered the art of explaining slippery subjects through humour. They would take a major news story and apparently merely knock it about in a light, spontaneous chat on TV. But their mischievous dialogues often took us closer to the heart of the matter than acres of self-important newsprint. (Here they are in a famous sketch from 2007 about the financial crisis)

How I would have loved them to address cricket's confusion about the "spirit of cricket". The old controversy was reignited this month when Sri Lanka "Mankaded" Jos Buttler. In the spirit of admiration rather than emulation, in this piece I imagine a conversation between the two great satirists, reflecting on Mankading and cricket's odd attitudes towards morality...

"So what is it, this spirit of cricket thing? Presumably it's about behaving with dignity out on the pitch and that kind of stuff?"

"Oh no, not really. Most players can get away with swearing at each other non-stop for five days without contravening the spirit of cricket. We don't get involved morally at that level. Better to turn a blind eye."

"You mean sledging - that's the right term isn't it? - does not contravene the spirit of cricket?"

"Not really. No, cricket tends to celebrate verbal abuse as "banter", even though it's very rarely funny. Let's put it this way. If someone sledges you all day in a Test match, the correct response in modern cricket is to go up to him at the end of play and say, "I loved the way you showed real passion about playing for your country, you seem like a champion cricketer, can I buy you a drink, as I'm sure you're a great bloke off the pitch."

"So the appropriate response to someone calling you a "f****** ****" for seven hours is to say, 'Thanks, can I buy you a beer?'"

"Exactly."

"Now I'm confused. So abusing someone who is simply doing his job is fine. But when an opponent performs a run-out, entirely within the laws of the game, he has broken the spirit of cricket, and the crowd starts booing and the whole occasion is apparently demeaned?"

"You are beginning to understand how the phrase "spirit of cricket" can be thrown around."

"But what could Sri Lanka have done to avoid the Mankading? Other than the threat of a Mankad, there's no other way of preventing a batsman setting off for a run from an advanced position is there?"

"Not really."

"And I suppose, in the heat of battle in elite sport, no one offers warnings before acting within the laws, do they?"

"Well, actually Sri Lanka offered two warnings."

"So they offered two warnings to an opponent who was - deliberately or, in this instance, accidentally - gaining an illegal advantage, and yet they still broke the spirit of cricket?"

"According to lots of people, yes."

	Everything up to and including my actions are "within the spirit of cricket". Anything I don't like about the actions of other players is "against the spirit of cricket"

"So if acting within the laws is against the spirit of cricket, what does upholding the spirit of cricket look like?"

"It's about not taking advantage of the fact that a man can lose his mind immediately before eating a slice of cake."

"I'm sorry, you've lost me."

"Back in 2011, poor Ian Bell offered a plea of temporary insanity brought about by the immediate temptation of a slice of cake. The 'spirit of cricket' jury gave him a reprieve, effectively a second life as a batsman."

"You're joking, right?"

"Deadly serious. Ian Bell made a brilliant hundred at Trent Bridge against India. But after the last ball before tea, he lapsed in concentration and assumed that the ball had crossed the boundary when in fact it hadn't. As he sauntered off for tea, the Indian team dislodged the bails, and Bell was run out. That is indeed out, according to the laws. But after an English delegation went to the Indian dressing room to complain, India retracted their appeal.

"That is, they invited Bell to bat again. Not because he wasn't out, but because they now realised that the prospect of tea had clearly clouded Bell's mind. Pundits agreed that everyone had behaved superbly. After all, how could a man be expected to remember the laws of the game when he can already sniff the aroma of chocolate cake in his nostrils?"

"This spirit of cricket is incredibly complex and malleable, isn't it? It looks as though you can explain or condemn almost anything using the rhetoric of the spirit of cricket."

"Exactly. That's the magic of it. It's all about not crossing a line."

"Whose line?"

"My line."

"What do you mean your line?"

"Everything up to and including my actions are 'within the spirit of cricket'. Anything I don't like about the actions of other players is 'against the spirit of cricket'."

"So it's possible for two people to argue for hours about someone 'crossing the line' without anyone knowing what or where the line is?"

"Exactly. That's the brilliance of the idea."

"Let's go back to the Mankading controversy. Wasn't there some background controversy about the bowling action of Senanayake, the bowler who performed the Mankading?"

"Senanayake's action has been reported as suspicious by several officials - i.e. it may be deemed a throw rather than a bowl. He will have to go to Cardiff to have his action specially filmed and analysed to see if it is legal after all."

"But isn't there a risk, when spin bowlers have to attend special testing, that they will simply bowl with a slightly different and 'more legal' action during the forensic examination?"

"What do you mean 'risk'? Basically, almost everyone who is tested eventually gets cleared. Think of the whole thing as a cooling off process."

"But what about the bowlers who don't have questionable actions? Aren't they placed at an unfair disadvantage by having to bowl in the traditional manner?"

"What do you think this is, a charity? This is cut-throat, elite sport. There is no room for sentimentality."

"Except the spirit of cricket?"

"Except for that, of course."

-------

The Economist on Mankading

THERE was a controversial incident during England’s one day international (ODI) against Sri Lanka at Edgbaston last night. Sachithra Senanayake, a Sri Lankan bowler, ran out Jos Buttler, England’s best ODI batsman on current form, while he was backing up (pictured). In other words, as Mr Senanayake ran in to bowl, Mr Buttler wandered down the wicket to make it easier to complete a quick run. Having spotted this (and apparently having already warned Mr Buttler twice), Mr Senanayake stopped in his delivery stride, removed the bails and appealed for the run-out. Despite having the opportunity to withdraw the appeal, Angelo Mathews, Sri Lanka's captain, backed his bowler and Mr Buttler was given out.

“Mankading”, as it is known, named after Vinoo Mankad, an early proponent of the art, highlights an interesting divide. By and large it is frowned upon by professional players. Alastair Cook, England’s captain, described the incident as “a pretty poor act”, adding, apparently without irony, “there is a line and I think that line was crossed tonight.” Backing up as the bowler approaches, pros argue, has long been an accepted part of the game. As with many de facto sporting rules (which might also include footballers returning the ball to the opposition when a player is injured or the "neighbourhood play" in baseball, in which umpires will call a runner out so long as the fielder's foot is in the general vicinity of the bag) a team allows opposing batsmen to get away with it because they expect to be granted the same courtesy themselves. In this sense, they are entitled to be angry when the unwritten code is breached. Certainly, Mr Matthews could have few complaints were he now to be run-out in a similar fashion. Indeed, it is classic game theory on his part: weighing up the short-term benefit of disrupting a stable equilibrium against the long-term consequences of retaliation in kind.

But judging by others’ reaction to the incident, non-professionals (including your correspondent) see nothing wrong with Mankading. Stealing a few yards before the bowler has released the ball is gaining an unfair advantage. Put-upon bowlers, who have watched as the game has been skewed further and further in favour of batsmen, have every right to call them out on it. What is more, their right to do so is enshrined in the laws of the game, which state: "The bowler is permitted, before releasing the ball and provided he has not completed his usual delivery swing, to attempt to run out the non-striker."

Nonetheless, abiding by rules is not the same as acting in a right-minded way. Thepreamble to the laws of the game say cricket "should be played not only within its Laws but also within the Spirit of the Game". But who are the guardians of ethical norms in sport? It increasingly seems as if the principles of professional players are accepted, de facto, as correct. And they have judged that Mankading is not permissible but, for example, appealing for an LBW decision when the bowler knows the ball to be missing the stumps is. It is the same in other sports. In football, pundits talk, in pseudo-moralistic terms, about strikers having “every right to go down” when they sense the merest contact from an opponent in the penalty box. The moral imperative, they seem to argue, lies with the defender not to touch the attacker, rather than on the attacker not to play-act.

It is perhaps inevitable that professionals should become sport's moral arbiters. After all, their conduct is watched by millions every match. This has the effect of normalising their behaviour. What is more, when public judgment is required it is undertaken by ex-professionals on sports programmes, who tend to share their sensibilities. In their defence, there is also perhaps a case that professionals, paid to eke out every advantage, are more aware of where sport’s pressure points lie, and so are the best judges of what constitutes a crossing of the moral line. But either way, eventually that relentless professional viewpoint is bound to dominate everyone else’s thinking.

There might be an argument for moral relativism; that given the pressures they face, professionals should play to different standards than the rest. But this, it seems, is just a way of saying that professionals’ conduct can be less ethical than others’. And there is a difference between what has become accepted and what is right. In an ideal world, it would be the amateurs who would have the right to decide what is morally acceptable on the sport’s field; the enthusiasts that ruled as philosopher kings above the self-interested professionals. Having played Sunday cricket for many years, your correspondent suspects that those who most cherish cricket’s spirit are to be found on the village green, not the county square. If they say Mankading is moral, who are the pros to disagree?

Cricket - There's more grey to chucking than we might think

Osman Samiuddin in Cricinfo

A decade ago cricket's ancient and embedded hyper-morality crashed into the modern world's burgeoning thirst for reality television. The focus for this communion was Muttiah Muralitharan, and more specifically his action. Two TV networks, ESPN (in India) and the UK's Channel 4, broadcast what were paraded at the time as definitive acquittals of Muralitharan's action, which had till then been called periodically, sanctioned occasionally, and the subject of hysterical debate permanently.

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Muralitharan went through his repertoire of deliveries with a steel-embedded plaster brace around his right arm, from bicep to wrist, and with admirable good nature. He looked a little uneasy in the ESPN show, a little too much like the guinea pig just becoming aware of his centrality to bigger, buffeting winds. But he went about it like a man who felt he needed to.

He bowled to Michael Slater in that one, to recreate match conditions. There was a doctor present too, explaining the unique physical quirks of Muralitharan's wrist, arm and shoulder, though he felt a little like Dr Nick Riviera, whose only residency of note has been on The Simpsons. Ravi Shastri, for ESPN, was quadruply burdened, as host, judge, jury and, eventually, the benefactor who cleared Murali. Shastri did so in the manner with which we are all familiar, effectively hype-mastering a science documentary. For Channel 4, Mark Nicholas managed a sombre posture, considered and inquiring but above all providing a kind of bipartisan seal on matters.

The issue by then had become so divided along racial lines that a non-Asian clearing of Murali felt necessary. That was the ultimate takeaway, of course, that Murali did not chuck. He could not with that steel brace on. Even Slats, an Aussie, said so.

In hindsight it is not so much the details of Murali's case that were important as was the fact that cricket felt the need for this public trial by TV in the first place. Even today, viewing it produces the kind of cringe only a certain kind of reality show does; especially the eagerness with which Muralitharan is cleared, as if he was guilty of some crime.

Though he looks uncomfortable in the ESPN version, Murali looked cheery and eager for Channel 4. He was probably a willing participant, perhaps even an instigator in doing the shows, but that is hardly the point. He was compelled into it by cricket, feeling no other recourse was available to prove that he was not some evil, cheating villain who would leave cricket forever corrupted. That is precisely what umpires such as Ross Emerson and Darrell Hair seemed to think he was, no-balling him with such ugly fervour that it was impossible to avoid feeling a vicarious humiliation at what Murali underwent. Men are prone to delusions when invested with the tiniest bit of authority in any case, but when furnished with a haloed moral authority they become monsters, or cricket umpires.

Hair and Emerson were after all only maintaining professional tradition. In every purge of suspect actions, umpires have led the hounding, right at the front of bloodthirsty crowds. Chuckers (and even the word is so phonetically derisive) have never been just men with kinks in their actions, or have seemed to bowl thus as a natural outcome of the overarm bowling action, which basically predetermines some degree of straightening (as an ICC survey discovered back in 2004). Cricket has treated chuckers as lepers because cricket doesn't have a reliable sense of a scale of bad: it can summon about the same amount of moral outrage for slow over rates as it can for Mankading, intimidatory bowling and match-fixing. It has a spirit nobody can define but one everybody screeches about when it is - regularly and easily - breached. So Murali and Saeed Ajmal walk around with an asterisk floating above them. To their detractors they are asylum seekers who exist only because of the weak-kneed liberalism of a governing body.

Maybe now the urge to purge is suppressed a little but the moralising over suspect actions remains; in the smugness of Australia and England that their offspinners do not bowl doosras, or feel the need to wear long sleeves (Shane Warne, one failed drug test plus one corruption scandal to the good, sniggering at Ajmal's long sleeves in the World T20 is a classic example of cricket's wonky moral scale); in Michael Vaughan tweeting and Stuart Broad responding to a photo of Ajmal in action and, metaphorically, nodding and winking. That yanks into black-and-white territory what is an inherently grey matter.

Suspect actions can be deliberate but they can also be functions of the mechanics of human bodies we do not understand. Could anyone have imagined that a study would find 99% of bowlers in cricket straighten their arm to some degree? What effects do injuries have, as a fairly serious accident did on Ajmal's right forearm when he was younger? How to explain the squirmy spectacle of Shoaib Akhtar being able to bend his elbow in ways that normally ought not to have been possible?

Where, in any case, is the study that sheds light on the exact nature of the advantages gained from greater elbow straightening? It is said that bowling the doosra is impossible without breaking the acceptable degrees of flex, but how to explain Saqlain Mushtaq, the pioneer, who did it with almost no visible bend at all? He even bowled it under the eyes of Hair and Emerson and elicited not a squeak, so he must have been fine, right? Even if we make the crazy assumption that post-Murali, Hair might have been chastened?

	Where is the study that sheds light on the exact nature of the advantages gained from greater elbow straightening?

****

Cricket cannot continue being blind to the grey of this issue because soon we might be in greyer territory. Last week the ICC's cricket committee expressed its concerns about the identifying, reporting and testing of suspect actions. The processes, they said, need to change.

The primary reason appears to be discontent with the testing labs at the University of Western Australia in Perth, where bowling actions have hitherto undergone testing. The time and cost of sending a bowler that far has always been problematic but now more issues have emerged. One official familiar with the meeting last week says that there was concern about discrepancies in the findings of the Perth labs and others around the world. Apparently the Perth lab has not been following the exact protocols for testing actions that the ICC has laid down, disagreeing with the nature of those protocols.

So the ICC wants to accredit other labs around the world, in England, South Africa and India initially, and ultimately standardise testing protocols and results. The utopian aim is to have testing centres in every Full Member country, so that bowlers can be observed, tested and corrected at domestic level before they get further.

More significantly, they are also testing body sensors that could capture real-time analysis of a bowler's action during a game. These were tested by under-19 players at the recent World Cup but only in net practice, and much more work needs to be done before it goes further. The calibration of the sensors on the arm is a particular issue, especially after players dive in the field.

In time, that will be the least of the problems, because trickier questions will arise. Who will wear sensors in a game? Those who have already undergone testing once? Others we suspect have a kink in their action? Nobody, as the ICC says, is cleared permanently, so everyone is under the scanner theoretically. Singling out someone who may have a kink but has not been tested officially places an undue burden on the bowler and recreates, in a way, the TV trial Murali underwent. How real is real-time? Will we be able to see the results after each ball, after each over, after each session, after each day?

Mike Hesson has already asked how those with suspect actions will be policed: what happens, he said, if a wicket falls off a ball delivered by an action in breach of the laws? Will a TV umpire review it immediately? Umpiring technology hardly needs further complication. As it stands, these discussions haven't begun but these are difficult and complicated questions. It is, after all, a difficult and complicated issue, even if it feels sometimes that cricket has still not grasped this.