Wednesday, June 27 2012

THE EDITOR: The record will show that England won the second ODI (and the series) quite comfortably. What it will not show is that Chris Gayle was given out unfairly just as he was taking the England bowlers apart. It will not show that Graeme Swann practically begged umpire Tony Hill to give him out, which he did after some hesitation. But Hill is yet another umpire who has a history of bad decisions against the West Indies. Had Hill chosen to give Gayle not out and England reviewed (which they would have, given Swann’s insistence), he would have remained not out.

Now I fully expected Swann to have been reprimanded, at least, and/or fined for excessive appealing. To me, Swann’s behaviour was worse than Denesh Ramdin holding up his note. And while I agree that Ramdin’s act was ill-advised, I cannot see the basis for his fine. Would he have been fined if the note had said, “Hi, mom”?

Now, in an ironic twist of fate, we hear that Dwayne Bravo has been fined for commenting on the appalling decision against Gayle. What was this supposedly offensive comment? “It is okay, umpires make mistakes. That’s accepted but not when they see it after and they realised they made a wrong decision and stand by it.” That sounds pretty mild to me. You fine him 20 percent of his match fee for that? And the instigator, Swann, is not even warned? How unfair.

I just read on Cricinfo that nine out of the ten bad decisions on the England tour have gone against the West Indies. So what chance does the Windies really have when the umpires (on-field and TV) and match referees feel they must genuflect to the English?



Noel Kalicharan

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