Cheating at Cricket

MR. SIMON HEFFER, Deputy Editor of The Spectator  (just imagine!) writes in the manner of an ill educated and ill-bred gutter journalist, a species that is multiplying like flies in Britain  these days. The man who said that the Press  and the nation rise and fall together was bang on target.

          The "relentless circulation war (in Britain ) is breeding ever more front-page slashes among the battery of national newspapers, causing pain and outrage to many. Once again, Press  standards are under scrutiny." These are not my words. They have been taken from a recent report on the British  Press in The Khaleej Times .

          Look at what the British  Press  has done to Prince Charles  and Princess  Diana. There is talk of 'cheque-book journalism', the use of 'spoilers' to 'head off other' exclusives,' and of 'a meaner twist in the struggle for readership.'

          Mr. Heffer  in not the only one after the Pakistan  Cricket team now touring England . Every single paper, especially the tabloids, has tried to outdo its rivals in Paki-bashing. But the paper for which Mr. Heffer wrote, The Sunday  Telegraph (on July 12) is not a tabloid. Or so one thought until one read his poisonous piece.

          First, he has not even his facts right. He says the 1987-88 England  tour of Pakistan  was spoiled because of 'the Pakistanis' desperation to restore national moral after a humiliating performance in the then-recent cricket World Cup .

          Dear Mr. Heffer , it was the other way round. For one thing, a side which reaches the semi-finals of an international tournament cannot be said to have performed 'humiliatingly.' England  had lost the Cup to Australia  because of Mike Gatting 's suicidal reverse sweep off Allan  Border. Had the England captain not attempted that entirely needless shot, he would have won the game for his country. So the England captain was not in the best of moods when the Pakistan  tour started and Faisalabad  had to happen. Had England won the Cup, Mr. Gatting would have been in a far happier state of mind and even twenty decisions going against England wouldn't have ruffled him.

          Similarly, had England  beaten Pakistan  in the Fifth Cup final at Melbourne  earlier this year, umpire Palmer and the British  Press  would have taken a lenient view of what happened at Old Trafford . The third of what the current series was the 50th Test match between Pakistan and England in almost four decades of cricketing relations between the two countries.

          The first major row was when the MCC  lads, touring Pakistan  under Donald Carr , threw a pail of cold water on umpire Idrees  Baig and then said that it was a case more of youthful exuberance than malice. All right, everyone (barring Mr. Baig, of course) laughed it off. This was in the early fifties.

          Then Imran  Khan complained about umpire David Constant on the 1987 tour. The third was the Gatting affair at Faisalabad  and the fourth major row took place at Old Trafford . There must have been minor irritants along the way. However, this time around, the British  Press  had really gone to town against the Pakistanis but the Calumny Cup must belong to Mr. Heffer . But what can you do when the lead is given by the Prime Minister  himself? Remember what Mr. John Major said after Pakistan  had beaten England  in the final at Melbourne  (thank the good Lord it wasn't Lahore )? "Let them come to England this summer and we'll see." Or words to that effect.

          Mr. Heffer  quotes Allen Border  as saying that "wherever there was trouble in what is supposedly the least acrimonious of games, the Pakistanis are the common denominator." This is understandable, because Mr. Border was born long after Bodyline. And perhaps he was not playing when Sunil Gavaskar  fumed off the field in a Test match in Australia  some years ago, taking his partner along with him.

          Mr. Heffer  says Both Aqib and Javed should have been banned for the rest of the series. Again, "the ICC should have told Pakistan  that, moreover, no Test match involving Pakistan would be allowed to proceed if Javed was the captain of the side or Intikhab  the manager." The letter I in the acronym alas, no longer stand for Imperial.

          "World cricket does not need Pakistan ." "Pariahs of Pakistan."

          "Dr. Johnson would have said of him (Miandad ) that he has the morals of a cardsharp and the manners of a rickshaw driver  . . . his ethical deficiencies make him the last man to captain his country, even if that country is only Pakistan ."

          "Ultimately the public will find it has had enough. It will stop paying this group of cheats defile a once great game. And the blame then will rest not on the Pakistanis, but on the craven authorities that have let them get away with it for so long."

          Well, Mr. Heffer , cheating at cricket and at cards and at other things was born long before Pakistan . Of that later. Pakistan, more than any other cricketing country, has been campaigning for neutral umpires, but the Sahibs will have none of it. Why are the cheats calling for neutral umpires and why are the honest Sahibs opposed to the idea? And the British  soccer fans? Why are they hated all over Europe, Mr. Heffer?

          Now about cheating, Mister Heffer . Modern cheating was born in Britain . British  imperialism is the most pernicious from of cheating the world has ever known. Apart from enslaving myriad nations around the world, it deprived Germany  and Italy  of their place in the sun. Hence Hitler  and Hence Mussolini . Had Britain not cheated at imperialism, there would have been no Nazism and there would have been no Fascism . There is honour among thieves, they say. The British colonialists violated this time-honoured rule and are, therefore, directly responsible for every tragedy that has befallen mankind in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. But that's a long and painful story. We'll talk of cheating at cricket next week.

Some day, Mr. Simon Heffer , now Deputy Editor of The Sunday  Telegraph , will become a fully-fledged editor of a paper in England . I have his good at heart. Therefore, I want him to improve his mind. One way to do so is to read. One of my many editors used to say: "In order to be able to write well, sir, it is necessary to read well."

          It is a funny thing, though, that not many editors have the time (and in some cases even the inclination) to read. A young friend who wants to consign Mr. Heffer  to the deepest dungeon in hell has given me a marvellous book to read. Written by Mr. Derek Birley , Vice-Chancellor of the Ulster University, it is called The Willow Wand : Some Cricket Myths Exploded .

          Let us begin with Sir Leonard Hutton . Mr. Birley tells us how, after having made 364 against Australia  at the Oval in 1938, he deliberately kicked the ball over the ropes to prevent W. A. Brown  from taking a single to protect a weaker colleague from the bowling; even though he knew that the Australians were beset with injury problems. This happened nine years before Pakistan  came into being. Surely, this wasn't a case of unfair play? Sir Leonard is an honourable man.

          C. B. Fry has written in his autobiography, Life  Worth Living (as quoted by Birley) that the first Test match of 1905 was the game "in which Warwick  Armstrong introduced his method of bowling wide outside the leg stump to a numerous leg-side field. He was rather angry with me for describing this as 'negative bowling.' This happened 42 years before Pakistan  came into being. But surely, this was not cheating? Armstrong must have been an honourable man.

          In 1921, Armstrong, the captain of the victorious Australian team, Birley tells us, exploited "opportunities for delay at crucial moments, including the use of illegal trial balls." No cheating this, surely.

          "In 1953, the Cambridge  and England  bowler, Trevor Bailey, was brought on a critical stage of the game when Australia  looked like winning and England were in no position to, and he bowled wide down the leg side in order to restrict the Australians' scoring chances. His success, which led eventually to England winning the series, was the source of great national rejoicing." And why not? No cheating, this, and Bailey should have been knighted.

          In 1967, the reigning England  captain, Brian Close used "comprehensive time-wasting" tactics to save a county game. Close is no cheat. He is an honourable man. And you know what? When censured, he said he would do it again.

          In 1946-47, England  had Australia  on the run on the first morning of the first Test match. Bradman , then 28, was caught by Ikin off Voce. He didn't 'walk,' was given not out and went to make 187. No cheating this.

          In 1956, at Lord's, Truman  had Benaud  caught behind, first ball. He didn't 'walk.' Given not out, he went on to make 97. No cheating this. Benaud is an honourable man.

          I am citing one more incident from Sir Donald Bradman 's career; because there is no greater name than his in modern cricket. Says Ray Robinson , the Australian writer:

That was the Test (the third of the 1946-47 home series) in which Wright  felt sure he had Bradman  (3) leg before when the batsman moved in front of the stumps and tried to force to the on, a shortish ball, which leapt through too quickly for him. The bowler turned to appeal for lbw, both hands raised supplicatingly, and Evans supported him with gloves eagerly aloft. Umpire Scott rules against them. As if to provide circumstantial evidence of the correctness of the ruling, Bradman walked aside, rubbing a place on his anatomy, which was too high for the ball to have hit the wicket.

Surely, no cheating, this? Sir Donald is an honourable man.

          Then, Birley says that since 1899, the rule is when a ball lodges in a batsman's clothes, it is declared dead. Now, in 1893, W. G. Grace  asked a batsman, C. W. Wright , to hand him the ball after the latter had played a defensive prod. The batsman obliged at which he appealed against him for handling the ball and got him out. Comments Birely: "When, in the 1978-79 series against Pakistan , the Australian batsman Hilditch was given out after a similar ball-tossing episode, the BBC  reporter, Christopher Martin-Jenkins , declared it 'not cricket,' associating it with the presence of Packer players in Pakistan's team. He did not mention W. G." Why should he have? W. G. was an honourable man while the Pakistanis are born cheats.

          W. G. Grace  is regarded as the father of modern cricket. He was also the greatest cheat the world has known. Says Birely: "W. G. though the worst, was not the only offender amongst the gentlemen. F. S. Jackson, despite his aura of rectitude, was another captain of whom Darling  disapproved, describing him as one of whom the umpires were afraid and who did not scruple to take advantage of the relationship."

          Birley has given innumerable instances of blatant cheating by W. G. Grace . As I said, Mr. Heffer  has a lot of reading to do on the subject. Cheat that he was, Grace once said: "There is another thing that I am afraid of: that is that cricket will be made too much of a business like football."

          Says Birley: "Lord Harris, one of the pillars of the MCC , wrote: 'the psychology of the game is accurately condensed in these few words: It's not cricket . That winter, (1922-23), in Australia  J.W.H.T. Douglas , the England  captain, had threatened to report Arthur Mailey for illegally using resign to help him grip the ball. He was dissuaded when Mailey pointed out that Douglas's thumbnail was worn down to the flesh from illegally lifting the seam to help the ball swing. . . ."

          So, you see, Mr. Heffer , reading does improve one's mind. I am not done yet. This refresher course in cricketing propriety will be taken to its conclusion in due time.

I am getting rather fond of Mr. Simon Heffer , Deputy Editor of The Spectator , who wrote in such vice regal terms about the Pakistani  cricketers in The Sunday  Telegraph on July 12.

Apart from cheating, cricketers can also indulge in vulgar behaviour. 'Gentlemen' cricketers from England  tended to regard the Australians as vulgar when Britannia used to rule the waves. To cite but one example here from Cardus  on how   A. C. MacLaren  death with vulgarity. Says he:

Joe Darling  had placed three men near MacLaren's legs in a close semi-circle. MacLaren addressed himself to Darling: "Joe," he said, "what's the meaning of this?"

"What's the meaning of what, Arichie?"

"Why," said MacLaren, indicating with a sweep of his bat the crouching leg-side fieldsmen, "why, what are these people doing here, Joe?" "That's my field for you, Archie," replied Darling .

"MacLaren waved his bat at them again. "Joe," he said, "Take them away."

 . . . . Darling  declined to change his field, so Ernest Jones bowled and the match at last began. MacLaren drove Jones twice or thrice for straight four, then Darling removed a man from the leg-trap and sent him to the deep, behind the bowler.

"Thank you, Joe," said MacLaren. "Now we may proceed with the match like gentlemen."

The moral of the story is that if you are strong enough, you can always knock some sense into the opposition's head. But if you can't handle the other side, you shout cheats and a partisan press in four square behind you. Before proceeding further in the matter of Simon Heffer , a correction would be in order here. Mr. Heffer is the Deputy Editor of The Spectator  and not The Sunday  Telegraph as inadvertently reported last week.

          Now then, let's cheat some more at cricket in continuation of my personal workshop on cricketing proprieties. Should we now turn to the 1932-33 tour of Australia ? Bodyline. Remember Jardine  and Larwood  and how Australia came close to breaking off relations with Britain ? Jadine's one ambition of that tour was to break Bradman .

          For this purpose, the 'leg-side theory' was evolved which later came to be known as Body-line because the aim was to bowl extremely fast and extremely short on the leg side with a string of close-in fielders on the leg side. Larwood  developed this "art" to a nicety.

          The idea was to hit you on the arms, in the chest, on the chin, on the head in order to soften you into submission. " . . . few people in England  saw it as a fall from grace. Most were too pleased about winning the Ashes to worry about how it had been done." (Derek Birley ).

           In the third Test of the 1932-33 series, the Australian captain, Woodful , was dealt an excruciating blow in the chest by Larwood . This evoked furious crowd reaction, which became more vociferous when wicketkeeper Oldfield was hit on the head by the same bowler and the former took no further part in the match. Later, the Australian Board of Cricket Control sent the following cable to the MCC :

          "Bodyline bowling has assumed such proportions as to menace the best interests of the game, making protection of the body the main consideration. This is causing bitter feeling between the players as well as injury. In our opinion, it is likely to upset the friendly relations existing between Australia  and England ."

          This drew an imperious response from the MCC  which fully supported their captain and his team and told the Australians to cancel the rest of the tour if they so desired. "In the meantime, however, questions were being asked at Government level, with the British  Dominions Secretary involved and judging by the rumpus in the Press  both in Australia  and England , 'war' was about to be declared at any moment." (Peter Wynne-Thomas , England on Tour  p.93).

          This has been the bitterest and most controversial series of Test matches anywhere in the world. Since Pakistan  was to come into being 15 years later, it was not the 'common denominator' in these troubled Test matches. Mr. Allan  Border to please note.

          On their return home from Australia , however, England  were to find out in the summer of 1933 that what was good for the goose was also good for the gander. "Warner later recorded how at Old Trafford  Constantine and Martin-dale gave England 'a taste of their own medicine.' And as Bradman  wrote, 'A humorous sidelight was the reversal of opinion by players when they themselves had to face it." (Birley)

          So you see, Mr. Heffer , England  can give it to us but we can't give it to them.

          John Lever, making his debut in Test cricket in the first match of the series against India  at New Delhi  (Dec 17-22, 1996) took seven for 46 and England  won by an innings.

          In the third match of the series (Madras , Jan 14-19) Lever (5-59) was once again unplayable. Later, this match became famous for the 'Vaseline incident.' "Lever used strips of gauze coated with Vaseline to prevent sweat running into his eyes, but the umpires maintained that the Vaseline was used to keep the shine on the ball." (Peter Wynne-Thomas , emphasis added).

          So Herr Heffer , cheat me no cheats. I could go on and on but I have run out of patience and of space. But I assure you Herr Heffer, I am a friendly sort of chap and I hasten to assure you that if Britannia no longer rules the waves, it is for no faults of mine, I invite you cordially to visit these shores. You are assured of a right royal welcome here at Lahore .

          A red carpet reception awaits you here. The band will play Imperial Echoes as you alight from the plane and you will be driven in State  to the Gymkhana, where I will lay the table for you in the lawns and serve you with nibbu-pani and Imperial Echoes will be played again. Permit me now to present these lines from J. B. Priestly for your kind perusal: " . . . after all, there are other things than games, and England  is not ruined just because sinewy brown men from a distant colony sometimes hit a ball oftener than our men do." Auf Wiedersehen, Herr Heffer ! (Concluded)

Friday, August 7, 1992

Friday, July 31, 1992

Friday, July 24,1992