ICC and British tabloids - how can fans ever trust ‘em anymore?
Pakistan’s cricket team has most certainly pulled a Houdini and has undone the English side fair and square in the 3rd ODI at the Oval on Friday. Pakistan has been playing good cricket since the beginning of the series, and yesterday was time
for all their hard work to pay off when Pakistan managed to squeeze past the Englishmen who have been in tremendous form.
For a side who have been on a winning spree in all formats of the game and have just recently been crowned the T20 champions - to lose to a trouble ridden Pakistan side, struggling to find the right bowling combination following the suspension of the teenage
sensation Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif - is indeed worrisome to say the least.
It is imperative to note that Pakistan has been playing competitive cricket since the beginning of the ODI series, coming close to defeating England in the first two encounters despite their key bowler Mohammad Irfan battling with fitness, and proven to
be the one of the worst replacements for Mohammad Amir. For Pakistan to win under such circumstances, under the clout of a spot-fixing controversy is indeed commendable to say the very least.
ODI and Test cricket has always been subject to strategic game play. The players decide amongst themselves the strategy which would be employed and how the conditions affect play, where many a time the batsmen have to decide whether to save wickets and hence
score singles and doubles or go for the big shots. There will always be peculiar scoring patterns in a game of cricket, and all cricket fans are aware of this fact. To say that such scoring patterns come as a consequence of spot-fixing verges on the absolute
absurd. Pakistan team won the match fair and square thanks to the brilliant performance of Umar Gul who bagged a career best six wicket haul.
Andrew Strauss, the English captain, accepted the brilliance of Gul at the Oval, citing it as one prime reason for the defeat against Pakistan. However, British tabloid The Sun and the News of the World seem bent upon slinging mud on the Pakistan side with
their reports full of foolish suggestions and wild accusations.
“Pakistan looked flat when they batted and managed just 241 all out at a ground where 300-plus is commonplace,” John Etheridge states in his article, ‘How can fans ever trust ‘em?’.
Well, if it is commonplace for teams to score 300 plus on that ground, then it most certainly eludes the cricket fans how England can suddenly go on to lose 5 wickets when they looked all set to win the match? Is the world class side, the ‘current’ World
T20 Champions so vulnerable a team, that they could not score some 36 runs at 3.5 an over? This was indeed very strange, and this then puts forward the confounding question - must the cricket fans put up with this? A world class side, underperforming and losing
to ‘minnows’ Pakistan, a team who has been likened to the Bangladesh cricket team by many critics.
The British media has been in the habit of making wild accusations following a Pakistan win, suggesting oxymoronic ideas of what could have conspired on the field. When Pakistan bowlers mastered the art of reverse swing, it was called ball tampering. However
when English bowlers managed to do the same in the ashes, it magically turned into the ‘art of reverse swing’. In 1982 following a win against England by Imran Khan, the Pakistan team was accused of ball tampering by the British media. Is the taste of defeat
really a bitter pill to swallow for the British news agencies?
They then go on to suggest how the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 side must be banned from cricket? Well cricket fans beg for an answer. On what basis must the side be banned? On the basis of a report published in a tabloid that is known for slandering people? And what of the
ICC? If players all over the world, India, Pakistan, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Bangladesh-c747 have been approached by bookmakers, is the ACSU so ineffective that they could not stop such approaches by bookies to international players?
What assurances do the fans have that such advances will not take place in the future? When South African and Indian players were banned for match-fixing, were there suggestions of banning those cricket teams? What about the revelations of the Indian bookmaker
and his close contact with English captain and wicket keeper Alec http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Stewart-c91370 who he allegedly paid a big amount of money to extract information about matches? Not to mention the credibility of the President of the ICC who is known to be one of the most corrupt
politicians of India according to their own people.
“Sharad Pawar is the most corrupt Politician of India and is not a human being. This Greedy, Corrupt politician will certainly earn a bad name in ICC top post and in turn will bring BLOT TO THE NAME OF http://www.senore.com/Cricket/India-c750. THE SHAMELESS B**TARD HAS NO MORAL AND CHARACTER
IN INDIA WHAT TO TALK OF INTERNATIONAL LEVEL.HE HIMSELF IS A BLOT TO THE NATION. MAY GOD SAVE INDIA'S NAME IN ICC,” writes one of the countless Indian fans.
Can the fans even trust ‘em any longer?
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