What a pity

MAY 2000 - It is now clear to everyone I know that when Eric Hollies bowled Donald Bradman for a duck in 1948, the whole thing was fixed. How else can anyone explain why the world’s greatest batsman should get bowled neck and crop by the world’s poorest leg spinner ? That match was fixed the moment the Don walked in. The signals were exchanged, the bookies were informed by messenger pigeons and money changed hands as the man with a 99.99 average in cricket, went for a zero.

Frankly, this match-fixing thing has bored me no end, and I don’t necessarily mean the pavilion end. I can’t open a newspaper without running into some body fixing somebody else 25 years later with having thrown this match or lost that toss or dropped that catch or whatever else they are supposed to do in the big ground, where you go in only to get out. Kapil Dev is shedding tears large enough to cause a tidal wave and Manoj Prabharkar is singing like a canary. One half of the world is accusing the other half. Now you can no longer be sure why one side actually lost or lost on the field and won big bank balances. Carl Lewis in England is moaning and groaning, Intekhab Alam is fuming and fretting and Viv Richards the master blaster is talking about throwing away a toss quoting none other than the great Clive Lloyd of the West Indies. Is there nothing sacrosanct left any more or are we to live now onwards with doubts over every thing that didn’t quite jell when it happened ? I don’t know and I am sure neither does anyone else, but surely this whole business has been reduced to a farce of comical proportions, and not a very funny one at that. If we carry on at this rate, we will have no cricket icon left in a few weeks and the avalanche of suspicion and doubt will sweep everything away.

It is not a profound observation that just about everyone likes to do something chancy now and then. Playing the odds and placing bets is as old as time and has only gained in popularity. I am sure that when the Christians were fed to the lions bookies in Rome were having a field day. Betting is as natural to mankind as breathing and no one can take one step without being exposed to it in one form or another. Raffles, draws, lucky dips, bingo, cards, sweepstakes, the list is endless and highly innovative. There is always somebody planning to make you part with your money for a price off, a game of chance or a scheme designed to lure you to the edge of the water. The stakes don’t matter because you can spend a buck or a million; the principle is the same. I remember that one of our friends was an incorrigible gambler who broke all limits when he placed heavy bets on whether the fly buzzing about in the room would settle on the open sugar pot in the next one minute. Not only was he able to devise a gambling proposition out of an undecided and definitely confused fly, but more importantly got half a dozen people to reach for their wallets. I have no clue whether he had already fixed the fly, but I do know that within the last ten seconds, as tension mounted in the room, the darn thing actually descended and made a smooth landing in the sugar pot. Money changed hands and the fly was abused or praised in equal measure by the winners and the losers.

I think it is time to call this whole fixing business off unless we all plan to spend this current century debunking every cricket player and every cricket match with accusations of one kind or another. I have never quite understood how a team or some of its members can throw matches. Malik who was accused on more than one occasion and whose career has been terminated on grounds of great suspicion, was accused of throwing away a match in Canada. A friend who was in the ground - and being a small ground, a club ground actually, where voices carried, heard Malik cautioning the new batsman in, a bowler and the start of the team’s tail, to simply block the ball and survive. Malik who was batting with a score well over 50, said he’d do the needful at the other end. The new man had an almighty go at the very first delivery he received to Malik’s amazement. The ball having skied into the air was dropped ! Malik repeated his instructions, remonstrating with the tail ender and unbelievably, he repeated the shot and was out. Having run out of partners, Malik then started to do the only thing he could - slog. Eventually he got out and the match was lost by a few runs, 20 odd or so. Malik was blamed for playing a fixed innings and throwing the match away !

Cricket is a maddening game at the best of times and things happen totally without reason often enough. Somebody playing brilliantly one moment is liable to play the most hideous stroke the next and get out. The world’s safest fielders drop the world’s dolliest catches. The most lethal strike bowlers will deliver the most prosaic over right in the middle of a brilliant spell. The most seasoned and coolest cricketers will demonstrate the most appalling behaviour and get out to the most outrageous shots without any explanation whatsoever. Can anyone ever get over what Lance Klusener did in the World Cup ? Reports say that he ran all the way to the dressing room and said to his devastated team mates, “So nobody died, okay ? We lost the match.” How much did Zulu get for that totally mad act that threw the South Africans out of the running ? I suppose soon enough somebody will inform us that he took a heavy sum of money and the whole business was fixed from the time he walked in.

Of course our board has issued a typical silly statement saying that no one in the present team is involved in any hanky panky. How they have determined this is beyond comprehension but who can talk with the board ? With the ICC in a tail spin, cricket boards falling all over themselves and test cricketers crawling out of the woodwork and laying bare the goriest details, I am afraid this century will see the end of this great game that has delighted millions for hundreds of years. Perhaps there is an element of betting woven into every match, but the beauty, grace and sheer pleasure of the game has been sullied forever. Personally, I don’t care two hoots who fixed what. I would still give my right arm to see Viv Richards hook Bob Willis one bounce into the fence on a glorious sun-drenched afternoon in England.