Two former 'bad boys' of Test cricket pontificating on the loose morals of today's players on television recently had me laughing out loud. I could scarcely believe my ears.
On Sunday it was Tony Greig who was lecturing the viewers on 'double standards' and poor sportsmanship. This preaching followed the let-off enjoyed by Brian Lara before he had scored and after he had obviously edged a catch to the wicketkeeper during the second ODI against Sri Lanka at Bridgetown. The umpire (the neutral one at that) turned down the appeal and Lara carried on to smash 116.
Greig lamented the fact that today's cricketers do not 'walk' and gave us the noble example of golf where the players practice a form of ethics that is sadly lacking in most other modern sport. Greig is right. But there is one problem.
The former England captain, born in South Africa and currently an Australian citizen, is the man who pioneered the histrionic, even hysterical form of appealing and who charged at and abused an Indian umpire on the 1972-73 tour when his appeal was turned down. And you can be sure that throughout his career Greig never once helped an umpire by 'walking'.
One cannot ever remember ethics of the golfing kind during his playing days. And yet now he lectures us on player behaviour! And this includes a sermon attacking the Indian team following the 'Denness affair' in South Africa in late 2001.
Talk about the pot calling the kettle black!
A couple of weeks ago I had the 'privilege' of watching a short interview on PTV with the notorious former swing bowler of Pakistan cricket Sarfaraz Nawaz, a.k.a. "scum of the earth" (in the televised words of Sunil Gavaskar.)
This is the man if we are to believe his Northamptonshire and Pakistani teammates who can be considered the granddaddy of ball-tampering. And here he was -- with a straight face, mind you -- sanctimoniously telling the viewers that Shoaib Akhtar should have received the maximum eight-match ban penalty after being caught red-handed instead of the lighter sentence that was slapped on him.
A smug Sarfaraz went on to inform us that Shoaib was rapidly earning a badnam (bad name) for Pakistan cricket with his antics!
This from a player who, in the March 1979 second Test at Perth, appealed for 'handled the ball' against non-striker Andrew Hilditch after he had casually picked up the ball and tossed it back to the bowler. The umpire actually gave Sarfraz a chance to withdraw the appeal but he promptly declined to do so.
Badnam indeed!
To be fair to him, Sarfaraz is not alone in that club of ex-players who tend to sit on their moral high horses long after their careers are over.
Another example is Ian Chappell who as captain of Australia never lost a Test series from 1971-75. He also ushered in the era of the 'ugly Australian', a not-so-glorious tradition that his successors including the incumbent Steve Waugh have managed to maintain with alarming consistency.
Chappell was on the lecture circuit following the latest on-field contretemps between Waugh and Brian Lara and Ramnaresh Sarwan and Glenn McGrath in the final Test at St. John's earlier this month.
'Gamesmanship is one thing, abuse another,' was the headline for his latest column shortly after the Test match.
Quite right. Back in March 1974 he gave New Zealand opening batsman Glenn Turner a colourful mouthful during the second Test at Christchurch. Turner went on to score a century in both innings to give his country their first Test victory against Australia. The incident has led to bad blood ever since between the two Trans-Tasman teams.
Chappell has strenuously insisted Turner provoked him but never denied abuse was directed at the Kiwi. For sure Turner was not the easiest of men to get along with (just ask Cairns jr.) and his pathological hatred of virtually every Australian on the planet has been made pretty clear in his various autobiographies over the years.
Still, what could have been the excuse for Chappell being suspended for 21 days by the ACB for abusing the umpires during a Sheffield Shield game at Davenport in his final season for South Australia in March 1979? Later that season he received a suspended sentence for similar antics while playing for South Australia against the touring English team.
"Abuse is a different matter (from gamesmanship)," writes Chappell in his column in which he advocates "liberal use of stiff suspensions" against offending players.
Well, he should know!
Clive Lloyd walked out mid-way through the Test series against Australia in the Caribbean in 1978 due to a pay dispute and led all his teammates out with him at the height of the 'Packer crisis'.
"Money may be the root of all evil, but it also solves a lot of our problems," were the words of a disco song of the '70s. No doubt Lloyd would agree. But in an interview last year he cited a similar walk-out over a pay dispute by the West Indies side (when he was manager) prior to the tour of South Africa in 1998 as one of the reasons for the team's decline.
"I would have walked to South Africa if I had been in a similar position I was very disappointed by what our players did," we were righteously told. The poacher had turned gamekeeper.
Long live double standards!
