Why the aversion to technology? Umpires at the wrong footing...

Every time a batsman or a bowler gets a poor decision, it is marked down to cricket being a game of glorious uncertainties. But these uncertainties are no longer left to the confines of memory. Umpires' mistakes are now magnified thanks to the invasive nature of technology on television. And with just about every international (and a large number of domestic) match being televised; an umpire's competence is immediately available for comment and scrutiny.

Mind you, it is tough on the umpires to do their job. They have to count the balls in an over, keep an eye on the bowler's front foot and in the split second it takes from then for the ball to reach the bat and a subsequent appeal to be made, take into account various aspects while dimming out the ambient noise and make the right decision. And then there are the moral policing they have to get into at times, ensure there are only 11 players on the field and keep a track of the light conditions! Mistakes are bound to happen. The thing to note here is that only aspect of their on-field duties that can be adversely affected due to stress is the decision-making after an appeal. Because it's now or never...

So why are these gentlemen subjected to ridicule? There have recently been two incidents when players have been called back or given out after the on-field screen (mandatory at international venues) showed the umpire to be wrong. Why, then, not use this in the first place? It isn't too hard now, thanks to the TV companies adding small nuggets of technology over the years) to implement a decision-making process while the bowler is running in. Relieve the umpire of the no-ball call, for instance. The third umpire is in a better position with square-on cameras to make that call. He can always tell the on-field umpire through the walkie-talkie and a couple of seconds isn't going to change the outcome of what is happening on the field. At least the call will be accurate.

Making the third umpire's involvement more direct can also be done in case of other decisions. He could keep an eye on nicks, LBW appeals and give out vital clues to the on-field umpire. The third umpire can always have tram lines on his monitor and ascertain to the on-field umpire whether the ball pitched in line or not. This is based on fact and not speculation or judgement.

This is pure information. Similarly, he could also tell the umpire whether it struck the batsman in line of the stumps or not. Whether it was going over the top or not is a judgement call that the on-field umpire can make since he has the best view. And he is also in a position to judge whether the ball would have hit the wickets taking into account the spin, seam or swing movement involved. But when he makes his decision, he at least has the facts in place. The uncertainties are then left to the outcome of the match making them truly glorious.

So while players can't even express disappointment over a poor decision, umpires can get away with murder. A player reacting to a decision is accused of "dissent" and "bringing the game into disrepute". Baloney! Umpires making mistakes adds to the glorious uncertainties. Ridiculous. If anything, a player showing dissent can be argued to show emotion and bring some character into the game. No? Then give the umpires the necessary information to make accurate decisions.

The ICC, in its customary manner has delayed the implementation of these and other such steps far too long. Playing conditions is another aspect that isn't uniform. And I don't mean the wickets or the size of the ground. These are great if they change every time since they then pose a new challenge and add character to the match. I mean things like whether the every Test should be played under lights to ensure completion of the day's quota of overs. Sure some grounds in the world aren't equipped with floodlights. So either don't have international matches here or forget about implementing this rule. Keep it applicable only where lights are available. Yes, I see how that contradicts my own point of uniformity, but at least this will make it more uniform than it is right now.

Why is all this important? Cricket is now a professional game. Money, careers, and a whole lot more ride on every match. Why shouldn't the players and sponsors get their fair chance? And what about the fan? If every Test is fairly judged and played, the fans will only enjoy watching it. There won't be reasons to crib like "poor umpiring cost us the game". Has anyone thought how strange that statement sounds especially since the umpires in Tests are supposed to be non-partisan? As an entity, they are supposed to watch the game and "enforce rules and arbitrate on matters arising from the play" not influence the outcome of it. In the same vein, a ground and a stadium is supposed to facilitate the play and not affect its completion (this is different from result, mind you).

So while we hate at Sachin Tendulkar getting an unlucky inside edge LBW or an opposition batsman getting a poor decision, we have to remember that the game at such a juncture is perhaps not being played in the best spirit. There are very few ‘walkers' in the modern game and rightly so. Highly paid professionals are there to enforce the rules and make decisions. If they make a mistake, it is squarely their fault. And anyways, according to the history and spirit of the game, a batsman is entitled to stand his ground and not walk until given out.

This could perhaps be one reason why cricket (ODI and Test) is stagnating. While there are advancements in equipment, run-rates, strategies, there is a regressive attitude about the laws, law enforcement and something as critical as umpiring. While the game tries to move ahead on the one hand, the other is constantly pulling it back. The end result is often a mundane, nearly formulaic offering.

T20 is here to stay and thrive

Ask Me!! I say....These are momentous times for cricket. There is the unmistakable sensation that the nature and course of the game are about to be changed forever. No doubt big deals went down in the 1770s when Hambledon were strutting their stuff on Broadhalfpenny Down. The shift was pretty dramatic when Test cricket began a century later, and then a century after that when One-Day Internationals, with floodlights and fancy flannels, was born.

But the advent and significance of Twenty20 compares with and probably surpasses any of that. In the past few days, it has been possible to believe that the shortest, brightest form of the game will shortly conquer the world. Something has started here and nothing will be the same again. The inaugural World Twenty20 in South Africa has been captivating. It was heralded by a breathtaking hundred from Chris Gayle, and nothing could have been better designed to persuade people to sit up and take notice than 117 from 57 balls.

The first week has been fast and furious, the joy enhanced by the realisation that players are learning as they go. England have stumbled into the second stage and play the first of three Super Eight matches tonight against South Africa. It has became obvious that the advance of Twenty20, invented in England four years ago, is unstoppable. The formation of a Champions League has been announced initially, the finalists from the Twenty20 competitions in England, Australia, South Africa and India.

It is being financed and marketed by India, will probably take place in Dubai and has a prize pot of £ 2.5m, of which £ 1m will go to the winners. That alone will have a huge bearing. In England, for instance, this year's championship winners will receive £ 100,000 for success over 64 days of cricket. If a similar number of hours can net you 10 times that, it does not take long to work out where you might put your resources. The number of group games in the England and Wales Cricket Board's (ECB) competition has been increased to 10, double that of the first year.

There is a danger of killing the goose, and the showbiz adage of leaving 'em wanting more seems to have been forgotten. A pity, because Twenty20 is nothing if not showbiz. All this has been accompanied by verbal appendices that Test cricket will be preserved. Maybe, but there are reasons to wonder. Twenty20 is magnificent entertainment. Fans feel part of it. Television, especially in India, was wary awhile, because you can get fewer adverts in 40 overs, and therefore less income than in 100, the span of the previously orthodox one-dayers.

But there are signs that telly is getting round that by wrapping adverts around the action or rolling them across the screen. Nobody should doubt that the administrators have recognised Twenty20's value, and while they know it is beholden on them to protect Test sanctity, that will become increasingly difficult. At present the intention is to restrict the number of Twenty20 matches played by national sides each year to seven outside International Cricket Council (ICC) events such as this. If sponsors and TV wish to be associated with Twenty20, the wind might be heading only in one direction.

Sachin Tendulkar driven by fear of failure

OK, here are the statistics. First the 417 one-day internationals during which he has pillaged 16,361 runs with a record 42 centuries; then the 146 Test matches producing 11,782 runs and 39 centuries. Thirty-nine Test centuries: the most any Englishman has made is 22. He needs just few runs to overtake Brian Lara and move into first place in the all-time list of heaviest Test run scorers. With his amalgamated tally of 28,143 runs and 81 centuries, Sachin Tendulkar is, of course, easily the most prolific international batsman in history.

Those are the facts. They quantify a career of extraordinary achievement that has made Tendulkar a sporting megastar and the richest cricketer that ever lived. Quite apart from the restaurant chain named after him and the Ferraris he is gifted, last year he signed a three-year commercial deal worth £22 million with Iconix, the marketing arm of Saatchi and Saatchi. Currently he advertises on TV everything from mobile phones and motor bikes to soft drinks, biscuits, cereal and deodorants. Indians literally speak, eat, drink and breathe him.

But what about the man? What lies beneath the diminutive frame and the cherubic face that has contrived to make him such a phenomenon, and how does he cope with the adoration and expectation of a billion Indians?Now 34, and in his 19th season on the international stage, can he quell the rumblings of general decline and steer India to their first Test series win in England for 20 years, or will this be the Little Master's quiet swansong?

If Tendulkar had seen reports of the furore surrounding David Beckham's arrival at Los Angeles Galaxy last weekend he would have been permitted a cynical smile. It's the kind of thing he deals with on a daily basis back home. Feted by a cricket-mad people, he is gawped and goggled at wherever he goes. Hundreds of rubber-neckers cluster around the Indian team bus as the players leave for the ground at the end of a day. They cry Sachin's name and attempt to touch him or push scraps of paper, rupee notes, even dried leaves at him to be signed. The same circus confronts him when the team arrive a short while later at their hotel. They are escorted inside to the lobby where a third wave of well-wishers - those smartly enough dressed to be let in - descends on their heroes requesting photo opportunities with their mobile phones.

It is an exhausting business being an Indian star and Tendulkar, forever the No 1 target, has evolved a particular technique to deal with such attention. He blanks everyone, deliberately avoiding eye contact. He justifies this by explaining that if he engages with just one face, one person, many others will see his lowered guard and clamour for his attention, and the situation would quickly get out of control. He knows such situations would be emotionally draining. Something has to give.

As it happens this avoidance approach suits Tendulkar. He is something of a paradox. He performs on a global stage yet actually doesn't like attention, invariably preferring the comfort and security of his home and close family to the sycophancy and scrutiny of public life. He is a private person, who occasionally used to venture out (sometimes in disguise) but now invariably retreats to his hotel room after play and, when traveling, plugs into his iPod rather than risk conversing with anyone. A rich and glamorous businesswoman who found herself sat next to him on a plane one day was amazed that he didn't pay her even a single glance throughout the journey.

In keeping with his personality, his batting is entirely methodical. It revolves around careful preparation and an economy of movement. His strokes are neat and compact. There is the occasional streak of virtuosity but his batting lacks the pure showmanship and bravado of other latter day greats like Lara or Viv Richards. Where those men attempted to demolish attacks, Tendulkar dissects them: he is a surgeon at work. To Lara a net was an occupational hazard; to Tendulkar it is the laboratory to create clinical perfection. He plans his innings meticulously and is forever working on something, roughing up practice pitches outside leg stump to simulate facing Shane Warne (he made 155 not out after doing so), or yesterday at Lord's honing his judgment against left-arm swingers and spinners, to replicate the angle and style of England's Ryan Sidebottom and Monty Panesar.

While Lara has been ostentatious in everything he has done - building extravagant homes, dating beautiful women, playing daring innings - living life on a Snakes and Ladders board, Tendulkar likes consistency and routine, residing in a duplex apartment with his wife and son in the leafy, seaside Bombay suburb of west Bandra close to where he grew up, dominated by plasma screens and hi-fis, and probably computer chess.

So far this intense single-mindedness has been strength. It has enabled him to concentrate on the job without distraction, and pile up records. But there are suggestions that, as he embarks on his 19th year of international cricket, it is becoming a weakness. Friends say he is almost a recluse and they find it hard to talk to him. As his power wanes, he is increasingly sensitive of criticism and wary of advice, almost as if he is in denial.

He had a fraught relationship with Greg Chappell; India's recently departed coach, because Chappell confronted his emerging flaws and proposed solutions. Questions last week from a journalist about Tendulkar's apparent vulnerability against pace bowling were blocked with a blunt no comment. But time waits for no one, and he is not the dominant force he was, as only one Test century in three years against a front-line Test nation - Sri Lanka - proves. After the disastrous World Cup there was an unprecedented call for his removal.

Watching him practicing at Lord's yesterday, a diminutive figure with bat and pads that appear too big for him, and hearing his thin, reedy voice, it is hard to escape the conclusion that he is a boy who never grew up. He is the Peter Pan of cricket, a precocious genius who retains a touchingly naive view of the world. He believes inherently that if he continues to do his thing, the power will return and those nasty Captain Hooks (the bowlers) will be cut back down to size.

The evidence, however, is that - at international level - he has developed a slight fear of failure. Latterly he has been more tentative in his play, less commanding, and it has cost him his wicket for an average of only 38 (as against a career average of 55). It seemed to have become a complex at this year's World Cup where, in the two key games against Bangladesh and Sri Lanka he seemed apprehensive and reluctant to play a shot, and was bowled both times for a sum total of four runs.

Recently there have been signs of him returning to a more dominant approach, and he toyed with the young England Lions bowlers last Saturday. Yet he has become so fastidious about his preparation he will not feel ready until he has gone through every permutation of bowlers and strategies. Yesterday he asked for an extra left-arm seamer to bowl in his net, and has requested two Panesar-like left-arm spinners be provided today (how ironic that India can't supply one themselves). He has been laboriously fine-tuning his judgment outside off stump, recalling that England's favored way of dismissing him is with a repetitive attack wide of the stumps.

You could look at this meticulousness two ways. Either its assiduous attention to detail, leaving no stone unturned in the quest for perfection, or its obsession bordering on neurosis that is in danger of curtailing his natural flair. There is a risk of paralysis by analysis. Bowlers used to be in awe of Tendulkar. Have the tables finally turned?

There is a mitigating factor. For all his amazing achievements, Tendulkar's name is not among the legends on the honors board in the visitors' dressing-room at Lord's. He has never made a Test century at the headquarters of cricket, indeed his highest score there is 31. Though he claims not to be motivated by statistics, he is keen, not to say desperate, to set the record straight. But, as Confucius might say, he who intensely desires, risks misfiring.

Tendulkar passes another milestone

15000 & Counting

When Sachin Tendulkar reached his fifty in the second ODI against South Africa, he went past another milestone in a career chequered with record-breaking moments. Tendulkar became the first batsman to accumulate 15,000 runs in ODIs - he was the first to 10,000 runs as well - and that didn't come as a surprise considering the productivity of his long career.

In the 189 ODI innings he has played when India has won, Tendulkar has scored 9061 runs at an average of 56.98, with a strike-rate of 89.72, all figures higher than his overall average. He averages 47.96 in 36 finals (of tournaments involving three teams or more), though the fact that he has scored only four hundreds, and that only 13 of those matches have resulted in wins, might come as a disappointment. Incidentally, he averages 89.10 at a strike-rate of nearly 100 when the team has won in a final.

He instantly became the face of the day-night game, and in fact Tendulkar has scored the highest number of runs while batting second in a day-night game and is third on the list of all-time highest averages while chasing under lights.

Tendulkar has scored the most runs by far (12019) while batting in the top three. However, a few batsmen have averaged better than him in the top-order, though none in the top five apart from Sir Viv Richards come close to his batting strike-rate.

Though he's been dismissed in the 90s in two consecutive matches, Tendulkar can take heart from his performance against South Africa in the ongoing series in Ireland. South Africa is the only team against whom he has failed to maintain an average score of 35 per innings.

Interestingly, the South African bowlers have managed to keep him quiet over the years, as reflected in his low strike-rate of 71.42 against them. The reason for his success at Belfast could be the absence of Shaun Pollock. Pollock has dismissed Tendulkar nine times in ODIs, along with Sri Lanka's Chaminda Vaas. The other successful bowlers include Glenn McGrath and Heath Streak, who have dismissed him seven times each.

Tendulkar also performs better at neutral venues than at home in India. His record in away games though is unimpressive.

Tendulkar currently averages over 50 in the 13 matches he has played in 2007. He has finished five years so far with an average of over 50 in ODIs. However, after a successful 2003 World Cup, he suffered a slump. He averaged a measly 34.97 in 37 innings in 2004 and 2005. Also, his strike-rate dropped gradually from 87.36 in 2003 to 77.05 in 2006.

Since the 2003 World Cup, Tendulkar has played 72 innings, in which he has scored 2824 runs at an average of 43.44 at a strike-rate of 81.85. He opened the batting in only 58 of these innings and though his record at No. 4 was equally impressive, he failed while batting one-down. In four innings at No.3, he averaged 8.75 and had a woeful strike-rate of 54.68. Clearly, Tendulkar prefers not to take first strike while opening the innings.

Although of late, he's looked to play with caution, he can be destructive and equally dismissive of opposition bowlers at will, as seen in the latest innings against South Africa, where he pulled the ball with an air of nonchalance.

That list includes the magical 49-ball 82 against New Zealand, Tendulkar's first as an opener. Since then, it's been many more runs on the board. Tendulkar has scored almost 26,000 runs in international cricket, and looks unlikely to be overtaken soon unless his nearest rival Brian Lara comes out of retirement as stated and makes runs at a far greater pace than his contemporary.

The Birth of Ball-by-Ball Commentary

Thats the way It all started. Hearing Cricket live as it happens

Monday (May 14) marks the 80th anniversary of the first ball-by-ball broadcast on the BBC. In Australia, matches had been covered since 1922, with the first Test coverage coming during the Sydney Test in 1924-25. But it was only in 1927 when the BBC drew up its new charter which gave it the right to send out reporters to inform the public about major events, that the idea spread to Britain.

Lance Sieveking, who had just returned from the USA where he had been impressed by live baseball commentary, decided to experiment with cricket. The BBC had already started with coverage of a rugby international - England v Wales at Twickenham - on January 15, 1927, and soon followed with other broadcasts from the Grand National and the Boat Race.

On April 1, The Guardian announced that the BBC had proposed adding cricket to its basket of radio sports. As with most newspaper comment of the time, the reaction was lukewarm at best. The problem was that the papers regarded radio as a direct competitor and for a long time refused to publish programme schedules.

On April 25, it was announced that the Reverend Frank Gillingham, a former Essex batsman and a well-respected preacher, would be the man who would deliver the first cricket commentary from Leyton on the first day of the match between Essex and the New Zealanders. The plan was for him to be on air from 2.10pm until 2.20pm, and then for a further four five-minute bursts on the hour with a general summary at 6.45pm. In between, the London Radio Dance Band would keep listeners entertained.

Although coverage was limited, The Daily Telegraph noted that "it is difficult to see how else such a broadcast could be made thoroughly interesting". A few days later The Guardian revealed that there were plans to cut into the scheduled band music "at any period when play is specially interesting".

As the day itself loomed, the Radio Times, the BBC's own publication, described the venture as "a new departure, an experiment, and something of an adventure" while admitting that cricket was "one of the slowest games in the world" and, as such, not exactly what people would want to listen to for long. "They will not have to sit through descriptions of maiden overs and wait while the batsman send to the pavilion for his cap."

There is no recording of the broadcasts, but newspaper reaction was, perhaps predictably, low key. The Western Daily Press described it as "deadly dull" to the general body of listeners, but the Edinburgh Evening News was a little more upbeat with its verdict of "a partial success".

The experiment must have gone down reasonably well at Broadcasting House as it quickly decided to cover more matches. Lord's proved a tough nut to crack, although issues about where the commentator could sit were finally resolved in time for Pelham Warner - who was overlooked for the Leyton match as his voice was deemed "too gravely melancholic" - to cover Middlesex v Nottinghamshire. Rather than a spot in or near the pavilion, he was forced to perch on top of the Clerk of the Works office, just outside the main ground overlooking third man.

The expansion in coverage indicates that the public warmed to the idea. The press remained defensive. In June, the Daily Mail slammed the "pathetic offering". On July 6, Warner, who had quickly become the voice of London commentary - or "running comment" as the BBC termed it - was at Lord's for the third day of Oxford v Cambridge, with a car on standby should that finish to whisk him to The Oval to cover Gentlemen v Players.

So cricket on the radio was here to stay. Sadly, Gillingham was soon gone. The end came when during a lengthy rain delay in a match at The Oval he ingeniously decide to fill in time by reading out the advertisements which surrounded the ground. In the rather puritanical and non-commercial era of Lord Reith, that was about as cardinal a sin as could be imagined and he was soon jettisoned.

Graham Ford- The new Entry for Indian Cricket Coach

Lets Check the man himself who did wonders for the SouthAfricans

Unassuming and determinedly low key, Graham Ford ascended gradually to the position of South African coach, by-passing several bigger and more familiar names along the way. A competent all-round sportsman, Ford is a former provincial tennis champion, has provincial colours for football and is a qualified rugby union referee to go with his cricketing credentials.

As a player, Ford had an eight-year first-class career in the Natal B team during the 1980s, but as a coach he moved steadily through the ranks, from the University of the Natal team, through the Natal Colts side to become senior Natal coach in 1992. He was the first to admit that he was fortunate with Natal in having Malcolm Marshall and Clive Rice on hand to help him guide a crop of outstanding young players which included Shaun Pollock, Jonty Rhodes, Lance Klusener, Neil Johnson, Dale Benkenstein and Errol Stewart.

At the same time, his personalised approach proved not only popular, but effective as Natal astounded South Africa in the 1996-97 season by winning the domestic first-class and one-day competitions. He had already had a go at coaching the South African A team and in 1998 took the A side on tour to Sri Lanka. At the beginning of 1999, Ford was appointed assistant to Bob Woolmer in New Zealand, a role he carried through to the 1999 World Cup, before taking over the senior position when Woolmer's contract ran out after the World Cup. In his time, they won nine of the 11 series under his guidance..

The Hansiegate Affair, however, has massively disrupted the South African side, and Ford was fired in 2001. Many believed he unfairly paid the price for internal power games within South African cricket. He moved to Kent as director of cricket in 2004, and while there oversaw an influx of South African players to the county. In 2006 he returned home to take charge of the Dolphins.

Lets see whether he can make up to Indian aspirations or not.........

A Monster Gentleman

Lets take a look into the world of Freedie- Andrew Flintoff

In the summer of 2005, Andrew Flintoff established himself as England's greatest allround cricketer since the days of Ian Botham, producing a succession of wholehearted and inspirational performances to reap 402 runs and 24 wickets in five Tests, and carry his team to glory in arguably the greatest Ashes series of all time. It was a performance that reverberated around the globe, and propelled Flintoff to the sort of superstar status that his many admirers had always believed was within his grasp, but had often despaired of him ever achieving.

Big, northern and mightily proud of it, he hits the ball harder than any English cricketer since Botham, and uses his colossal 6'4" frame to generate speeds in excess of 90mph which, allied to his metronomic accuracy and burgeoning mastery of reverse-swing, make him one of the most intimidating bowlers in the game. For a time Freddie was destructive and self-destructive in equal measure - his precocious skills and size led to a Test debut at the age of 20, but two years later he was struggling with his weight and his motivation, barely able to bowl because of persistent back problems, and barely worth a place in the Lancashire seconds.

In 2001, he was given an ultimatum by his management team, and requested to be sent to Rod Marsh's ECB Academy. It gave him the motivation he needed, and when England SOSed for him during that winter's India tour, he was a reformed character. Despite being found out by India's spinners, he picked up a maiden Test century against New Zealand and was an integral factor in a successful home summer in 2002.

Unfortunately, it was all too exciting for the England management. By the time they flew out to Australia in October, Flintoff had been bowled into the ground, and could barely walk after a hernia operation. But he returned to action in time for the World Cup, where he was the most economical bowler in the tournament, and come the 2003 season, he was ready to take centre stage.

He came of age in the Test series against South Africa, thumping a therapeutic 95 in England's remarkable comeback at The Oval to go with a defiant century at Lord's, and produced a starring role in England's series win in the Caribbean, where he learned at last to slip the handbrake and become a genuine attacking option with the ball. After helping England to a 2-1 series win in South Africa, he flew home early for an operation on his troublesome left ankle, forwent his honeymoon to speed his recuperation, then returned fitter and better than ever.

He single-handedly inspired England to a two-run victory over Australia at Edgbaston, in one of the greatest Tests of all time, followed up with a maiden Ashes hundred at Trent Bridge, sealed the series with a marathon five-wicket haul at The Oval, and embarked on a 17-hour bender culminating in an open-top bus parade through the streets of London.

By now, he was a global superstar to bracket alongside Sachin Tendulkar or Shane Warne, but arguably his finest hour of all was the manner in which he stepped into the breach as England's captain, on an injury-plagued tour of India the following spring. Leading from the front magnificently, he grabbed 11 wickets and scored five fifties in six innings, as England defied the odds to draw the series 1-1.

In July 2006 he underwent surgery on his left ankle, missing the Test and one-day series against Pakistan but, recovering ahead of schedule, was named England's captain for the Ashes in 2006-07. But even his supreme ability wasn't enough as his batting faded under pressure and the troublesome ankle required further injections through the series. His demeanour after the 5-0 thumping was in stark contrast to the beer-fuelled celebrations 16 months earlier, although he atoned in part by leading England to a surprise victory in the subsequent one-day CB Series, after being handed back the captaincy by the injured Michael Vaughan.

Being back in the ranks for the World Cup did nothing to improve his form with the bat, but Flintoff's time in the Caribbean will be remembered for one incident - capsizing a pedalo in the sea in St Lucia following England's defeat to New Zealand. As a result he was dropped for the next game against Canada and stripped of the vice-captaincy. He continued to pound away with the ball, but his efforts with the bat became embarrassing.

By the end of the World Cup he appeared broken and exhausted and missed the start of England's international summer.

Strange Innovations- Cricket World

Today we search through the kitbag of history to find a collection of eccentricities and innovations...........

The Aluminium Bat

Few innovations have been quite so cynical - and quite so short lived. Dennis Lillee and a friend called Graham Monoghan decided there was money to be made in selling bats made of aluminium. They were cheaper than their traditional wooden cousins and more likely to irritate the opposition too. When Lillee walked out to resume his innings against England at Perth in 1979-80, he was armed with metal. He had already used the ComBat against West Indies, when he made a duck. Now Mike Brearley protested. A stand-off ensued, which ended with Lillee hurling the bat towards the pavilion and the lawmakers stipulating that it was wood only from now on. ComBat sales plummeted.

The Skull Cap

There was tittering at the back when the 35-year-old Mike Brearley opted to face the Aussies in 1977 sporting a strange contraption that sat under his cap and protected his temples with two fang-like pieces of plastic. Trouble was, it kept slipping. "Oi, Brearley, why don't you fix it on with a six-inch nail," shouted a Trent Bridge wag. The only nails applied that summer, however, were to Australia's coffin: England won 3-0.

The Colored Hat

Hard to believe but in June 1973 Barry Richards walked out to open Hampshire's innings with Gordon Greenidge during a John Player League match against Sussex at Portsmouth's United Services Recreation Ground holding a bright orange bat. Essentially a marketing ploy, it prompted Graham Roope to threaten to use a blue version at the forthcoming Lord's Test against New Zealand. MCC stepped in swiftly.

The Crash Helmet

Dennis Amiss went further than Brearley by lining up for World Series Cricket in 1977-78 with an Evel Knievel-style crash helmet, produced - less glamorously - by a company in Birmingham and made of fibreglass with a polycarbonate visor. It could, said Amiss, "take a double-barrel shotgun from 10 paces", which sounded a touch paranoid. Calls for a quick single were occasionally obscured by the helmet's bulk - run-outs were not uncommon - but Amiss set a trend, even if the helmet was soon replaced by more streamlined models.

The Scoop Bat

First brought on to the market in 1974, the Gray-Nicolls 'Scoop' - lighter than traditional bats but with a larger sweet spot and thicker edges - was a big hit with international batsmen until the early 1980s. The scoop faded from view as the trend moved towards railway-sleeper bulk and brute force. But it enjoyed a mid-'90s revival in the hands of Brian Lara, who used it to score first-class cricket's only quintuple century. While the single scoop beloved of David Gower is consigned to history, many of Gray-Nicolls' contemporary bat models feature two or four scoops on the back.

The Unbuttoned Shirt

The good old Viyella shirt - part wool, part cotton - allowed the sartorial rebel to roll up his sleeves and undo the front to give the chest an airing. Keith Miller was never shy; nor was Richie Benaud. But a trickle became a trend under Ian Chappell's 1970 Australians, who were matched all the way for navel-baring by Wayne Daniel. The buttons disappeared at the start of the 1980s, leaving cricketers to concentrate on their hair-dos instead.

The Mittens

Essentially a pair of small, white boxing gloves, the mittens were first modelled by that innovator par excellence Tony Greig, who wore them during the 1975 World Cup. The thinking was that the greater surface area helped absorb any impact and thus provided more protection to the fingers, and they quickly caught on, with Clive Lloyd wearing them during West Indies' tour of England in 1976. Nowadays no self-respecting batsman would be seen dead in them.

The Shoulderless Bat

Presumably the theory was that, if you possessed shoulders like Lance Cairns, you hardly needed them on your bat. Cairns's shoulderless willow made by Newbery - known as an Excalibur but more often compared to a caveman's club - was responsible for two of the most frightening pieces of hitting in the last 30 years. At the Hutt Recreation Ground near Wellington in 1979-80 Cairns crashed 110 from No. 9 (Evan Gray: 4-0-50-1) to turn Otago's score of 48 for 8 into 173 all out. The next-best score was 14. Three years later, in a one-day international at Melbourne, he launched into a 21-ball half-century, including six sixes in 10 balls.

The Inverted Flowerpot

Floppy sunhats were de rigueur in the 1970s but Jack Russell kept the fashion alive until his retirement in 2004. The Russell version, described by his at times exasperated captain Mike Atherton as a "flowerpot of a thing", bespoke pure eccentricity. Only his wife, Aileen, was allowed to patch it up (he had been wearing the same one since his first-class debut in 1981), and he irritated the England management by refusing to wear an official coloured cap during a one-day series in South Africa. Compromise was reached when Russell agreed to sew on the England emblem. It was an emotional moment.

The Hand-me-Down pads

International cricketers tend to prefer using their own gear but a 14-year-old Sachin Tendulkar was hardly going to say no when Sunil Gavaskar bequeathed him a pair of his ultra-light pads. "It was the greatest source of encouragement for me," he said nearly 20 years later after passing Gavaskar's top world record of 34 Test centuries. Passed from one Little Master to another, the pads became part of the legend of Tendulkar.

The MCC Colours

The last time the England touring team wore the bacon-and-egg colours of the Marylebone Cricket Club was on the 1996-97 tour of New Zealand, although they had stopped referring to themselves as MCC 20 years earlier. The club's colour had been sky blue for about a century after its foundation in 1787 but changed for reasons that remain unconfirmed. One theory is that MCC adopted the red and yellow of Nicholson's gin after the company's owner, William Nicholson, secured the club's position at Lord's with a loan. Gin and MCC? Surely not...

Martial Arts & its origin

The Root of it All - Bodhidharma

When starting a journey, one begins at the beginning, the root of it all. And in the Eastern martial arts, almost every tradition traces their legends and history to a single individual.

Almost every book on the history of the Asian Martial Arts begins with a reference to Bodhidharma. Somewhere in time, contact with his teachings has occurred in most of the major branches of these arts. He has been given many names over time. In addition to Bodhidharma, he was Tamo to the Chinese, he is named Pu Tai Ta Mo in Sanskrit and Daruma Daishi in Japanese. In the Buddhist world he is known as the 28th Patriarch of Indian Buddhism or the First Patriarch of the Chinese Zen Lineage.

The history is based upon many legends and stories, complicated by the many names. I have attempted to provide a summary of these stories as a starting point. The dates vary from the 400’s to the 500’s AD. I have used the most widely accepted dates in this brief history.

Bodhidharma was born a prince in the southern regions of India and raised as a warrior to succeed his father as king. He had been trained in the Kalaprayat technique of martial arts. Bored with his training Bodhidharma began to study with a Buddhist teacher named Prajnatara. On his deathbed, Prajnatara asked him to go to China to re-awaken the followers of Buddha. Some sources say that almost five percent of the population were Buddhist Monks even before the arrival of Bodhidharma. Legends vary in the method of his arrival, some say he traversed the Himalayan Mountains, others say he rode a ship around the coast. Regardless, he arrived around 526 A.D.

Upon arriving in China, the Emperor Wu Ti, a Buddhist himself, requested a meeting with Bodhidharma. The Emperor asked him what reward he had received for all of his good works. Bodhidharma answered that he had accrued none. Bodhidharma was unable to convince Wu Ti of the value of the new teachings he brought from India.

Frustrated, Bodhidharma set out on a northerly direction. He crossed the Tse River, and climbed Bear's Ear Mountain in the Sung Mountain range to where the Shaolin Temple was located. It had been founded forty years before by Buddhist monks and was famous for its translations of the Buddhist scriptures into Chinese. Bodhidharma sought entrance into the Shaolin temple. He was accepted after he was able to prove that he was committed to Buddhism.
When he arrived Boddhidharma was appalled to find the monks fat, and without the ability to even stay awake during his lectures. In addition, the monks were unarmed and easy pray to bandits when they attempted to go out into the world to teach. So they decided to stay in the safety of the monastery. This explained one reason that Buddhism was no longer as widespread as it had been.

Legend has it that Boddhidharma then went to a cave and stared at a wall for seven years. He is said to have cut off his eyelids to stay awake in meditation, and so is usually depicted with bulging eyes. Others say that he cut off his eyelashes and that they fell to the ground and became tea plants. Recognizing the ability of tea to help a person stay awake has made tea a part of the practice of zazen.

Bodhidharma created an exercise program for the monks which involved physical techniques that were efficient, strengthened the body, and eventually, could be used practically in self-defense. When Bodhidharma instituted these practices, his primary concern was to make the monks physically strong enough to withstand both their isolated lifestyle and the deceptively demanding training that meditation requires. It turned out that the techniques served a dual purpose as a very efficient fighting system, which evolved into a marital arts style.

His system involved dynamic tension exercises. These movements found their way into print as early as 550 A.D. as the Yi Gin Ching, or Changing Muscle/Tendon Classic. We know this system today as the Lohan (Priest-Scholar) 18 Hand Movements, which serves as the basis of Chinese Temple Boxing and the Shaolin Arts. Many of the basic moves of both tai chi chuan and kung fu can be seen in the scenes recorded on the walls of the temple.

These skills helped the monks to defend themselves against invading warlords and bandits. Bodhidharma taught that martial arts should be used for self-defense, and never to hurt or injure needlessly. In fact, it is one of the oldest Shaolin axioms that "one who engages in combat has already lost the battle." Bodhidharma also taught medicine to the monks and arranged for Chinese doctors to come to share their knowledge with the Shaolin. In three years the monks became so skilled in both the martial arts and medicine that they start to be feared and respected by the bandits. This went a long way toward continuing the spread of Buddhism and Zen thoughout China and the rest of Asia.

Even the death of Bodhidharma is shrouded in mystery. Legend has it that he was poisoned by one of his followers disappointed at not being selected as the successor. Regardless of the reason, Bodhidharma died in 539 A.D. at the Shaolin Temple at age 57. They laid him to rest in a tomb there.

The strangest legend regarding Bodhidharma is that three years later he was met on the road by a government official, walking out of China towards the Himalayas with his staff in his hand and one of his sandals hanging from it. Having dined with Bodhidharma on many occasions, the official was certain it was him. When the official arrived at the monastery and recounted his experience, the monks opened the tomb only to find it contain just a single sandal.

The forms created and taught to these monks are generally believed to be the root of the martial arts in China. While there is evidence that portions of these movements existed prior to the arrival of Bodhidharma, he was the one who codified and recorded them and from there they have gone to spread throughout the world.

Creating Your Nature Space

One of the best ways to heal a physical problem or reduce emotional stress is to interrupt our daily routines with experiences that reacquaint us with Nature. As we are swept up, captivated, and enthralled by the displays of Nature's wonder, we sense the immutable balance that is our own source of creation, our Spirit.

The difference between normal recreation and experiencing Nature's creative expressions is that in seeking Nature for our own delight, we pay attention to the rejuvenation it inspires us to feel inside. We enter Nature's creative arena in order to recognize our union with it and to be regenerated.

Everything about Nature is impressive, from the bumblebees that aren't supposed to be able to fly but do, to the intricacies of flowers, the wonders of giant redwoods, and the brilliance of the sun glinting off a streambed filled with glistening stones. Everywhere we look we see that Nature is our greatest teacher. Engaging Nature means engaging our roots, which tie deeply into our heritage and allow us to appreciate our Earth home.

Imagine renting a canoe or kayak and going out for a paddle. We quickly settle into a different inner rhythm. Our arms move in harmony with the current, and we forget our worries and become part of the life around us -- an intimate part. When we use chalk, watercolors, or oil paints to express the beauty of our gardens, hills, or snow banks, we flow into the images as we create them. What we depict in images has a greater impact on us than mere words.
Our lives become richer when we allow our senses to be stimulated by the images, sights, and sounds of the natural world. In experiencing Nature's creativity, we open our own vibrant inspiration. Our Life Steward energy is trying to get us to be creative, to participate in Nature's playground. We're in it for the fun of it -- to calm our nerves, to awaken our delight in life, and to get out of our heads and into our bodies.

All of our creative efforts involve Nature in one way or another. When people say that they are uncomfortable in Nature, they are saying they have lost the fit with their own most basic source of creative expression. We have become city dwellers and business people. But first we were cave dwellers and hunter-gatherers. The Earth and the natural world are imprinted in the core of our being.

Finding inner balance comes from returning to the images of Nature and moving in harmony with life around us, not remaining locked away in constructions of concrete and cinder block. It is in our blood, our genes, to be Life Stewards -- stewards and caretakers of the land around us and within us.

When we play music, walk in Nature, garden, hike, or sit quietly in majestic places, we redesign our lives more powerfully than we can through all the thinking and planning and articulating of great and lofty plans. When we find what we love and share it with others we love, our futures find us. When we move out of our inner harmonies by trying too hard, planning too much, wanting too badly, we drop the ball of momentum in our lives.

Activity without the need for achievement or control is the real nourishment. When we do something creative, we're reawakening the rhythms of our lives that are essential to us.

Creating Your Own Nature Space

A Nature space is any place -- large or small, wild or planned, in your office, in your home, greenhouse, or back yard -- that takes you into Nature's splendid mystery.
Spend ten minutes before work admiring or tending your indoor plants in your living room, greenhouse, or porch. Whether you have one plant or twenty-five doesn't matter.
Create window boxes or gardens that can be your Nature spaces, where you attend to yourself by attending to Nature.

Enjoy Nature's wild spaces by sharing a few moments on the way to work admiring and enjoying the sun shimmering through a stand of white pines, a freshly turned farmer's field, or a turtle crossing the road. On your way to work, find and pause for a few moments to breathe deeply, relax, enjoy, extend yourself into the Nature space around you and find renewal there.

If you find yourself too busy to take time in the morning or evening to develop a Nature space, take five minutes before or after lunch to look around your office, or the place where you spend most of your day, and see where Nature spaces appear. Is it in the picture of the Taj Mahal on your wall calendar, or in the bouquet of flowers on your table? Is Nature in the water in your glass, or is the music you hear a takeoff on Nature's sounds? Is Nature in the crackers and cheese on your plate, or in the ant crawling across the carpet?

Find Nature around you, and enjoy the moment.

Animals Teach Us Spirituality

Animals have been the spiritual companions of humans since the beginning of recorded time. The earliest indication of the spiritual significance of the human-animal relationship can be found in the 20,000-year-old cave wall paintings of Cro-Magnon people. In many if not most cultures, animals have served a variety of spiritual functions: They have been linked with supernatural forces, acted as guardians and shamans, and appeared in images of an afterlife. They have even been worshipped as agents of gods and goddesses. Many ancient creation myths, for example, depict God with a Cow. These stories do not explain the existence of the Cow; like God, the Cow is assumed to have existed from the beginning. In this assumption, these primordial people revealed their intense attachment to their animal companions.

That animals touch us in a deep, central place is not a modern-day phenomenon, but one that pervades the history of the human-animal relationship. We sense that we can benefit spiritually in our relationship with animals, and we are right. They offer us something fundamental: a direct and immediate sense of both the joy and wonder of creation. We recognize that animals seem to feel more intensely and purely than we do. Perhaps we yearn to express ourselves with such abandon and integrity. Animals fully reveal to us what we already glimpse: it is feeling -- and the organization of feeling -- that forms the core of self. We also sense that through our relationship to animals we can recover that which is true within us and, through the discovery of that truth, find our spiritual direction. Quite simply, animals teach us about love: how to love, how to enjoy being loved, how loving itself is an activity that generates more love, radiating out and encompassing an ever larger circle of others. Animals propel us into an "economy of abundance."

They teach us the language of the spirit. Through our contact with animals we can learn to overcome the limits imposed by difference; we can reach beyond the walls we have erected between the mundane and the sacred. They can even help us stretch ourselves to discover new frontiers of consciousness. Animals cannot "talk" to us, but they can communicate with us and commune with us in a language that does not require words. They help us understand that words might even stand in the way.

Lois Crisler did not use human words to achieve a spiritual connection with animals. Instead, she used their language. Sitting in a tent with her husband one twilight morning in Alaska, she heard a sound she had never heard before -- the howl of a wolf. Thrilled, she stepped outside the tent and impulsively howled in return, "pouring out my wilderness loneliness." She was answered by a chorus of wolves' voices, yodeling in a range of low, medium, and high notes. Other wolves joined in, each at a different pitch. "The wild deep medley of chords," she recalls, "...the absence of treble, made a strange, savage, heart-stirring uproar." It was the "roar of nature," a roar that brings us back to an essential place we have known but lost. It returns us to nature and to creation, not intellectually but viscerally. We recollect in the cells of our bodies, not in our heads. If we open to it, we can make out the image of our animal kin by our side.

Fulfilling our longing for the wild, our primordial desire to hear "the roar of nature" within ourselves, does not require that we camp out in Alaska, or even encounter an animal in its natural habitat. Spiritual contact with an animal can happen under quite ordinary circumstances.

I once took a yoga class while visiting my sister in Mumbai, in a beautiful studio with floor-to-ceiling windows. As the class was engaged in exercise, we noticed a dog standing outside the window, innocently looking in. The dog seemed curious, and wagged his tail in a relaxed motion. Soon, he was joined by another dog, who also watched us through the window. Occasionally one or the other would bark -- not a loud bark, but a "here I am" kind of bark. For the entire hour-and-a-half session they stood there, noses to the glass, looking in with interest. They seemed calm, but intensely attentive, and clearly interested in joining us. One could assign any number of explanations to their absorbed interest. I think, as did others in the class, that they picked up on some kind of "positive energy" generated by our collective yoga practice. I put quotes around "positive energy" because I don't t have precise language to describe what I think the dogs sensed. And that is the point. They were able to perceive, and experience, something some of us are dimly aware of and would like to understand, but cannot find words to describe. Animals can teach us to live outside of words, to listen to other forms of consciousness, to tune into other rhythms.

It was the rhythm of music that one musician, Jim Nollman, used to communicate with whales. Along with several other musicians, he recorded hours of human-orca music in an underwater studio every summer for twelve years. Positioning their boat so that the whales would approach them, the group transmitted their music through the water. Most of the time the orcas made the same sounds, regardless of whether the music was played or not. But not all the time. For a few minutes every year, a "sparkling communication occurred. In one instance, the sound of an electric guitar note elicited responses from several whales. In another, an orca joined with the musicians, 'initiating a melody and rhythm over a blues progression, emphasizing the chord changes."'

An uncanny meeting with a whale proved a decisive spiritual moment for another person, a retired female teacher who I have enjoyed hiking with in northern California. While hiking along the ocean, she decided to rest on a large, flat rock jutting out over the depths. She lay there, relaxed, listening to the sound of the water and the sensation of the breeze on her body when, she reports, she felt a presence: "The hairs on the back of my neck went up; I was compelled to sit up." Sitting up, she saw a whale, resting perpendicular on her fluke. As her eyes met the whale's, time stopped. As they gazed at each other, the woman entered an eternal stillness, feeling an unmatched intensity. Difference dissolved; words were irrelevant. She felt a deep sense of connection with all of life. No longer restricted by the categories of "them" and "us," she felt herself flow into a seamless web of existence in which all of life is one. In complete harmony with the whale, this retired teacher felt that she inhabited a web of relations some call "God." She had encountered God in, and through, the eyes of a whale.

Cross-species communication may be so extraordinary because we cannot rely on identifying with the creature the way we identify with human beings for connection. Our human relationships are often based on relating to a being like ourselves: We can identify and empathize with each other because we share similar experiences. Of course, there is nothing wrong with this. The ability to identify with others forms the basis for personal relationships, social bonds, and social justice.

Animals, however, offer us a unique opportunity to transcend the boundaries of our human perspectives, they allow us to stretch our consciousness toward understanding what it is like to be different. This stretching enables us to grow beyond our narrow viewpoint. It allows us, I believe, to gain a spiritual advantage. How can we possibly appreciate and move toward spiritual wholeness if we cannot see beyond our own species? How can we come to know God, or grasp the interconnectedness of all life, if we limit ourselves to knowing only our own kind? The goal of compassion is not to care because someone is like us but to care because they are themselves.

Any spiritual discipline, in any tradition, invites us to open our hearts and minds. This invitation represents an ongoing exercise; the desire and attempt to open to others in our midst are the essence of the spiritual process.

Animals can lead us spiritually in a variety of ways. They can teach us about death, participate in our social and moral development, enhance our physical and psychological well-being, and heighten our capacity to love and to experience joy.

The Search for Real Wing Chun

The Wing Chun as described is the power derived through Chi(inner power) to establish a lethal contact.

Over the years many people have attempted to define and demonstrate the "real" wing Chun, only to meet with utter disaster intellectually, physically or most often both. However, these failures are largely individual. What everyone has failed to discuss has been the massive effort undertaken by the Chinese government to discover the real wing tsun through a number of highly scientific means. By scientific, I mean more sophisticated than simply insisting that real wing tsun does in fact exist somewhere and that anyone questioning such an indisputable fact is just an ignorant nut rider. Whatever that means.

Recently, Bullshido's Department of Homeland Security was given an inside look at the multi-faceted government program all across China and in various chinatowns. The locations of the various labs remain classified but I have brought you this report; the first of its kind anywhere and a breakthrough in the search for real wing Chun.

Each of the labs competing to find the elusive wing tchun represents a different lineage of the art. Like the Lawrence Livermore / Los Alamos rivalry of the early atomic age, there is fierce competition for government dollars and bragging rights. Truly, the first facility to reproduce the real wing chun on video or really anywhere at all would put all other labs to shame and be able to lord this achievement over them in lineage wars held all over the internet and even Boztepe-style sneak attacks. The search has primarily been undertaken through four main methods, detailed below.

Chi collisions

So far, the method that has produced the most significant results has been near-lightspeed collisions of ordinary (non-real) wingy chingy students with various other things believed to contain trace elements of the real ving stun. Since these objects are much heavier than the charged particles used in a normal accelerator and cannot be accelerated through conventional magnetic fields, the levitation is powered by increasingly larger and larger sources of chi.

In order to obtain such large amounts of chi, special chambers housing legions of monks have been constructed in many labs. The monks are given identical zen koans to meditate on and immersed in dit da jow to allow the greater transmission of chi (which is like bioelectricity). Above the large pool of dit da jow the air is thinner than normal atmospheric pressure to simulate the mountain air of the shaolin temple, but richer in oxygen than ordinary air (since chi is breathing energy). The monks float in the dit da jow and enter a state of deep sensory deprivation so they can be more in tune with their minds and bodies (since chi is muscle control). One of the many variables in the tests is the koan given to the monks for any given run of the accelerator and the exact secret ingredients of the jow, which are known to vary wildly between labs.

The chi is drained from the monks's centre of gravity and inner ears (since chi is balance and coordination), then collected to be focused through particularly devoted and sinophilic kung fu dancers. An electrode is inserted into the dancer who then focuses the positive and negative chi into opposite ends of the accelerator, creating pockets of net ying and yan and, through great squinting and holding of breath, a levitation field.

So far, the greatest success of these collisions has been achieved at the New Ho King lab where, according to my waiter, the real wing chun was thought to have been isolated for a brief half-life of 23ms before tearing itself apart with what was thought to be a four-dimensional circle step. When the Department of Homeland Security visited the competing Kom Jug Yuen lab down the street, we witnessed an elderly man being collided with a pair of butterfly knives and it was really cool.

Fantasy Completeness

Taking a queue from computer science, several labs have tried to prove that real ving rhames exists at least in theory. Great strides have been made by scientists at the Swatow lab where a class of imaginary constructs was discovered called Fantasy-Complete. The class of constructs consists of various things such as Santa Claus, the liberal jew media, judo groundwork and Tra Telligman's missing pectoral. Swatow also showed that real whinge chun is also Fantasy-Complete, so if any of the previous objects were proven to exist then finding real wing chun would not only be possible but relatively easy to solve. Good-tasting low-calorie cola was thought to have been this breakthrough, but it was later shown that previous proofs of its Fantasy-Completeness had been flawed.

Internet posts

As is plainly evident on this forum, the numerous wing chun lineages have been fighting an open battle across the entire internet to write a lengthy, pointless, fallacy-ridden and backpedalling post who's contents are not yet fully known. It is believed by many top researchers that once the optimal balance is struck between the above characteristics and others that the real wing chiu will be made manifest by the collective contempt of all those who read the post. It is currently unknown if videos that are held up as examples and then later recanted affect this balance. The perfect post has not yet been written, but the labs are known to have several hundreds if not thousands of posters working round the clock to devise it through standard Shakespeare Monkey probability.

Frozen Yip Man

The lab that revealed this last research method to me wished to remain anonymous for fear of scientific espionage and even threats of assassination through bad hash. One technician, his brow drenched with sweat and knees shaking as he told me, has claimed that beneath one of the many labs (not necessarily his) the corpse of Yip Man is stored in cryogenic suspension. Attempts to harvest an intact cell nucleus for a chi collision have so far been unsuccessful, but (and the technician stammered as he told me this fact) the lab in question is working frantically to devise harder and harder mixes of opiates and other street drugs in attempt to revive the corpse.

Whether the undead Yip Man will reveal his true successor or simply consume the flesh of the living through an elaborate affiliate scheme is currently unknown, but makes for entertaining discussion over several pots of cold tea.

ICC Cricket World Cup 2007- A Summary of Fool's Day Out

World Cup 2007
A Cup-full of lessons

So how will the first World Cup staged in the West Indies be remembered?
Will it be how Simon Barnes put it in the Times of London, as "the worst sporting event in history", or as Owen Arthur called it: "a tremendous success"? The detached sports writer and the involved prime minister clearly saw it from two entirely different perspectives, which is bound to be the case for most observers.

Certainly, the cherished dream of Chris Dehring, the chief organiser, that it would be the best World Cup ever proved to be an illusion. It was always an unrealistic aim; and even though there were extenuating circumstances, it turned into a nightmare. The vision of Dehring, as all West Indians, was for Brian Lara, showered in champagne and against the backdrop of dazzling fireworks, to be holding the trophy aloft at the remade Kensington Oval as his became the first team to win the cup on home turf.

That script further called for a gripping tournament, filled with brilliant performances and close contests, played in front of large, enthusiastic, cosmopolitan crowds stirred by the spirit of the Caribbean. It was a far-fetched scenario but the eventual reality was even more improbable.
By the time the cup was presented, for the third successive time to Australia, there was general relief that the tournament was over. It was too long, contained too many lop-sided matches and was blighted with bad luck from the shocking murder of Bob Woolmer that threatened its very continuation within the first week to the shambles that was the showpiece final.

It seemed somehow appropriate that it should end as it did, with the disappointment of the first of the nine finals to be shortened by the weather compounded by the ignorance of four highly-paid, supposedly experienced officials that erroneously extended it into the darkness of overtime. By then, the West Indies, ill-prepared for such an important assignment, had been dishonourably discharged and Lara was a week into retirement. There was no doubt who the irritated public held responsible for the mess.

At the presentation ceremony after the final Malcolm Speed, International Cricket Council (ICC) chief executive, Ken Gordon, West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) president, and Dehring, the chief executive of World Cup, were each roundly booed. Whether such derision was justified is a moot point.

But instead of the tournament being the best ever, it was condemned in the international media as, variously, a shambles, a disaster, and a debacle, to go along with Barnes' hyperbolic assessment. Yet, at the same time and for justifiable reasons, Arthur was in buoyant mood. Avid cricket fan that he is, the cricket in itself was not his main concern. He was fully satisfied with how his nation coped with what he saw as "definitely the most complex thing that Barbadian society, not the Government, has had to do".

When the tournament was awarded to the Caribbean, and the Super Eights round and the final to Barbados, Arthur said it was "an expression of confidence of who we are and what we can do as a people". It was significant, he felt, that the governments of such small states "should pursue the belief that this region should host something as important as a World Cup".

The people, not least those who staffed the local organising committees (LOCs) in the three years preparing for the event and the thousands of helpful volunteers who were a feature at every venue, proved conclusively that they can cope with a global event of this magnitude.

All the pre-tournament doubts over internal travel and accommodation, based on practical experience, proved largely unfounded. Not every bag arrived in every island at the same time as its owner but there were none of the predicted foul-ups, and the use of cruise liners between Barbados, Grenada and St Lucia in the closing stages could be the template for a new method of regional travel. While there were valid complaints from visitors about the cricket and matters related to the cricket, the overall Caribbean experience made an unmistakable impression.

The 6000 or so Australians who descended on St Lucia and Barbados for the last two matches, and the few hundred Irish who celebrated as only they can their team's unlikely passage through the first round in Jamaica, are unlikely ever to forget it. Judging by comments in the press from a cross-section of other nationalities, this is generally true.

But more telling considerations will follow for Arthur and other prime ministers. They have to convince their constituents that their massive financial investment was worth it and that benefits will follow through the much-hyped legacy.

It is imperative that proposals for maximising the use of the fantastic new and renovated stadia be put quickly in place. Otherwise, they will become a drag on the several economies and on the electoral status of governing parties. For those concerned solely with the cricket side of the cup, "tremendous success" was hardly a fitting description, although unforeseen circumstances conspired against it.

Only two things remained constant throughout - the awesome invincibility of Australia and the adversity that stalked the event at every turn. Sandwiched between Woolmer's murder and the fiasco of the final, two of the most attractive teams, India and Pakistan, and consequently their fans, were eliminated in the first round; the keen interest of West Indians was diminished by their team's four losses in five Super Eights encounters, and match after match meandered towards its predictable conclusion.

Of the 51 matches over the six weeks (not counting the unofficial warm-ups), six were won by more than 200 runs, including one semi-final, seven by 100 or more and seven by eight wickets or more. Only four went into the last over.

Bangladesh and Ireland were the fairy-tale qualifiers over India and Pakistan. Their success was spirited, deserved and a tremendous boon to the game in their countries; but it diminished the quality of the cup. In any sporting tournament, upsets are likely and not every contest will be tense and exciting. But such shocks and mismatches were heavy body blows.

If such developments on the field were beyond the control of the ICC, World Cup and the LOCs, matters off the field were not. Anxious to demonstrate the so-called globalisation of the sport and against repeated, if unofficial, advice, the ICC increased the number of teams to 16 and kept the length over six weeks. The tedium typified in South Africa four years earlier was now amplified by the proliferation of dud matches.

There surely must be a review for the next World Cup, in 2011, to ensure that there is more urgency to the contests in the later stages and that the Super Eights are not compromised by matches that end before lunch (or dinner) and feature top teams that omit their leading players with a semi-final in mind.

From the start, the tight restrictions imposed at and around the stadiums, also a complaint in South Africa, and the exorbitant ticket prices rankled fans who saw them as the high-handedness of planners concerned only with gratifying sponsors, lacking a feel for the game and for the uniqueness of the Caribbean, and with little consideration for the pockets of the average West Indian.

These, more than anything else, led to the heckling of Speed, Gordon and Dehring, even though several of the more draconian measures were relaxed towards the end. There were hundreds of lessons to be learned by the ICC, the WICB and regional governments from World Cup 2007. They would be foolish not to heed them!!!

The Legend Coach- Bob Woolmer

Gud Evening! Today i would like you all to have an insight in the life of one of the legendry coaches of all time. The Man named: " Robert Andrew Woolmer" or better known as BOB WOOLMER

Bob Woolmer was the most highly regarded cricket coach in the world. As a consequence he was employed by two leading Test nations, South Africa and Pakistan, and approached by two more, England and West Indies. In addition he was a good enough player to have been signed by Kerry Packer for World Series Cricket. Underpinning his abilities was a schoolboyish enthusiasm for the game matched in recent times, perhaps, by only Colin Cowdrey and Shane Warne.

Few individuals within the game have had to make so many contentious decisions. Joining Packer and hence forfeiting the chance of captaining Kent and England; signing up for the first breakaway tour of South Africa in the sure knowledge that a Test career would never be resumed; turning down the opportunity to coach England in 1999 when the ECB's first choice ahead of Duncan Fletcher. For such a mild-mannered man he was mired in undue controversy - and that was the case even before he met Hansie Cronje. Yet Woolmer never expressed any regret about the course of his life.

It is sad, not least for his family, that such a talented cricketing man will be remembered, at least by those with a passing knowledge of the game, for the circumstances of his death and his association with Cronje, a man who let him down badly. For Woolmer to emerge from his partnership with Cronje with his reputation untainted was testimony to his honest nature. The essential point was that Woolmer would not have done anything to harm the game he loved. He liked his money - which Test cricketer of the mid-1970s did not, given how poor the remuneration was pre-Packer? - but he liked cricket even more.

If he had had any knowledge of Cronje's involvement in match-fixing during his time as coach of South Africa and if there had been any such approach to his Pakistan players, then he would surely have reported it to the board and, doubtless, to the police too. As a natural conciliator, Woolmer would always reason rather than react. He did not have a temper. At The Oval last year, he asked every Pakistan player to swear on oath that he had not tampered with the ball. "They all did and, as they are a religious bunch, I tended to believe them," he said shortly afterwards. "I always feel the game should continue but to accuse Pakistan of cheating brings tensions to the fore. This kind of decision is potentially inflammatory. I was torn between my principles and a desire to help the side." He was on the point of resigning as coach. In retrospect it was unfortunate he did not do so.

One question that will engage the thoughts of English cricket followers is: would England have fared better had he become coach? The reason Woolmer did not take the job in 1999 was because he was immersed in trying to win the World Cup with South Africa. As to whether he would have taken it now, his love of the game, his desire to win a series against Australia - he never achieved this as a coach, although he did as a player - and the fact that he was not financially secure would all have inclined him to do so. The most probable scenario, though, assuming the ECB would have wanted a younger man as Fletcher's eventual successor, was that he would have founded his own cricket academy at a site he had earmarked near the Kruger Park in South Africa. This will now be established through a trust set up in his memory.

In his playing days and in his relationships with administrators and players when a coach Woolmer made friends easily, for all his obvious youthful ambition to play for England. Indeed, he was known in the Kent dressing room, which he joined in 1968, a time when the strongest side in the county's history was being forged, as 'Bobby England.' He was confident of his own ability, but it was submerged at first in a strong batting side. Woolmer's talents first became apparent in the one-day game, as a medium-paced swing bowler who would exert tight control in the middle of an innings with Derek Underwood at the other end. From 1975, when he made his Test debut for England, batting was his stronger suit.

Strange as it may seem now, there was something of the shop steward about him in his youth. He always liked the comfort of decent hotels, was keen on good food and wine and did not care for the ordinary accommodation that was the lot of the county cricketer in the 1970s. When Woolmer signed for Packer in 1977, he was at his peak as a batsman. His three Test centuries were scored against good Australian sides and David Gower, for one, felt he fulfilled his talent. A total of 19 Tests with an average of 33.09, might suggest otherwise. For whatever reason, when Woolmer returned to international cricket in 1980, he was not the same performer and his Test career was over by 1981. He hooked and cover drove as well as anybody in his era, yet was a little loose technically, especially early in an innings, his prominent left arm leading into the drive being executed well in front of his body.

If, arguably, he was just a little short of the highest level as a batsman, as a bowler Woolmer was under-used by England. In the modern era in one-day cricket he would have played in 200 or more internationals. As it was, his career was curtailed by a back injury in 1984, when he was still a fine county cricketer, surveying the field from slip as Arthur Fagg would have done - or Cowdrey. He was to return to Kent as coach in 1987 but insufficient time had passed since he had left the dressing room. Warwickshire were the beneficiaries and, once he had won three trophies in 1994 and shown he could handle Brian Lara, there was bound to be interest from a major Test nation.

As a batsman Woolmer will be recalled for his Cowdreyesque elegance; as a coach, for his innovations, his use of a laptop and the earpiece with which he once communicated with Cronje before it was banned; and as a person, for his gentleness, enthusiasm and generosity with his time and money. He gave too much of himself to too many people, some of whose motives he might not have recognised. Above all he was trusting of the human race and that quality, alas, might have led to his tragic death.

Adam Gilchrist and the art of innovation

Squashing glory

Watching it was like being transported on a magic carpet to other worlds but, once the ride was over, you were left to ponder an innings that was every bit as unusual as it was resplendent. And years from now, we're still likely to be talking about the day a humble little squash ball played its part in one of the great batting efforts of our times, the day Adam Gilchrist scored 149 off 104 balls in the World Cup final.
Dozens of my dear friends have written in to me since, questioning the legality of the innings. "If using a squash ball isn't OK as per the laws of the game, is his innings legal and does it count?" asked one. "And if it doesn't count, can Australia claim to have won a hopelessly one-sided and farcical victory?"
Another concentrated on the minutiae of the laws. "The law specifically prohibits a player from using equipment other than that permitted," he wrote. "And nowhere in cricket's 42 laws is there a mention of a squash ball as a permitted item. If you are not allowed to bowl with any tape or plaster on your fingers, I don't think you should be allowed to have a squash ball in your gloves when batting."
And that's precisely where we enter the greyest of cricket's many grey areas. As long ago as the 19th century, a South African gent by the name of Baberton Halliwell used raw steaks inside his wicketkeeping gloves, a method subsequently emulated by the likes of Alan Knott and Rod Marsh. Batsmen with poppadam fingers, as Nasser Hussain came to be known, have also been known to have extra padding and protection inside their gloves.
According to an article in The Daily Express, it's not only gloves that have been messed with in the quest to get ahead. It mentions how John Wright, the former New Zealand opener who coached India, used to glue his top glove to the handle, in order to maintain the alignment of elbow and shoulder. Even more fascinating is Tim Robinson's account of how Clive Rice, the South Africa and Nottinghamshire allrounder, would wrap strips of lead around the top of his handle to balance what was a very heavy bat.
Gilchrist had his own trick, not up his sleeve but inside his glove. It wasn't the first time that the squash ball had come into play either. At the WACA last November, he flayed the Queensland attack for 131 from 95 balls, but the experiment suggested by Bob Meuleman, a former squash player himself, remained just that until he got to the World Cup final.
It had been a frustrating tournament for him, as he admitted later. Half-centuries against the Netherlands and Bangladesh boosted his run tally to 304 runs, but there was no doubt that it was the other half of the opening combo, Matthew Hayden, that had intimidated the life out of opposition teams.
With his relatively light bat and atypical grip, Gilchrist had started to fall to the strokes that had once been his forte. The sliced drive to point was of particular concern and, on the eve of the game, he decided to give the squash ball another go.
What it did when slipped inside the left glove was make him markedly less bottom-handed in his approach. As Meuleman said in a newspaper interview later, "I've worked with him for 10 years and he an unusual grip in which his hand goes too far around the back of the bat. It [the squash ball] is a great big lump in your glove but it means that you can only use your bottom hand in a V."
According to Meuleman, who played a few Sheffield Shield games himself in the 1960s, the effect was dramatic. "He had a few hits before he went off to the World Cup; he didn't have the squash ball in and he hit them like he couldn't even play fourth grade. He put it in and he then hit the ball so good."
At the Kensington Oval, Mahela Jayawardene was well aware of the wonderful twirl of the bat that sent the ball scurrying to the point or cover fence that came to epitomise the Gilchrist way. Having suffered previously at Gilchrist's hands, Jayawardene blockaded the off side, with an isosceles-triangle formation of backward point, a short-square point and an extra-cover. The aim was to starve him of his main scoring outlet, thus inducing a rash stroke or two.
What the squash ball did was change his scoring areas completely. His last one-day century, against Sri Lanka on Valentine's Day in 2006, had highlighted his off-side strengths - 60 of his 122 runs came there - but he started off the World Cup final with a clip behind square leg and a stunning shot over wide long-on.
By the time he departed, with victory almost assured, only five of his runs had come in that favoured arc from backward point to cover. There were lofted shots aplenty, but most were struck with precision straight down the ground. A staggering 65 runs came from strokes in the V, including six fours and five sixes.
The ICC may have cracked down on graphite strips and the like, but when steaks - rare preferred to medium or well done - and cricket have been hand-in-glove, it's unlikely that the squash ball can be proscribed. Having tried it, as many readers no doubt have, we can safely say that batting with it is no picnic. A bunny with squash-ball-in-glove doesn't a Gilchrist make.