It has been a week since I last posted. Whenever an emotive issue arises in any sport many commentators discuss the merits of the disaster or whatever and then there is a lull....then a storm. Well, it appears that cricket or to be exact, Inziegate has been in a lull phase for the past week. After all, cricket has been played so let me be the first (last actually) to congratulate Pakistan on their excellent form in the 1 day series versus England. England's team is way below standard without Flintoff and a very wobbly opening pair. Shabby bowling doesn't help! But even during this Younis Khan and Inzie masterclass the ball-tampering fingers have been wagging. I am, of course, referring to Shoaib Akhtar (good to see you back Shoaib) seen rubbing his thumb across the white ball during his walk back or was it the start of his run up. Who could tell? Well, I can categorically say that the spin doctors and nutters running sports media really are losing their marbles. There is no way jose that any bowler could or can be accused of tampering by allowing his thumb to rub the ball whilst in his hand. Now if his chisel of a thumb had been lifting the seam then that is another story but BALL-TAMPERING no. Pakistan are innocent on this absurd suggestion or was it an accusation by the media. Shock of horrors I received a telephone call just after this Shoaib ball rub had been shown on Sky and my friend, an ex-Kent colt no less, and someone who was shown how to swing a ball from Richard Ellison, a great seam, swing and length bowler in his day, said to me that he had spotted a Pakistan infringement far more shattering than anything else other than the Hair Doctrove incident at the Oval. What could this have been? Well my friend, I shall call him Ozzie, told me that he had access to the Sky technology whereby he could slow down a bowlers action, focus in on the arm, and investigate and examine whether any bowler's arm could be considered CHUCKING! What! I'll repeat that...CHUCKING young man! A whole new can of worms could be opened here. According to Ozzie the aforementioned bowler's inswinger was a clear chuck. But then of course the umpires (was it Doctrove I saw on the ECB TV link?)don't have access to this sort of technology thank goodness! Of course, with the current poor standard of cricket reporting it's unlikely any of the ex-pro's would or could pick this up but it does show that Pakistan have allowed their coaching methods (pre-Bob of course) to get just a little stretched, if it's true, and I know my friend Ozzie is a man of his word and very knowledgeable. So knowledgable and skilled in fact that he told me he practised swinging balls by swinging stones round the corners of brick walls. He's in his early 40's now, and I've never seen him bowl, except chuck an orange across a dealing room floor in the City at around 70mph, so a great talent appears to have gone begging Kent. Oh well!
What else has happened in the Inziegate situ? Oh yes, the date I gave you earlier, 15th September, well that has been changed. With all the supporters of cricket screaming for an early hearing and a clear up to the mess what did the ICC do? They did what all daft codgers do. They put it back further rather like schoolboys passing smelly underwear around a dormitory during a pillow fight. So the hearing is now on 27th & 28th September 2006. TWO DAYS....now this must be important. Picture this! There are 2 sides at the hearing. The PCB with players, ex-players, squads of lawyers, and on the other side a certain Mr D Hair and his lot. Well apparently it takes 2 days to hear what everybody knows....Inzie brought the game into.....and a certain bowler tampered the ball. Robert Redford, I hear, is being considered for the role of D Hair! Someone send him a Wisden!
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