Politics and cricket, they say, should never mix. But, since CLR James, Basil D’Oliveira, Bodyline and probably well before, they have; it’s an unavoidable fact of life. And yet sometimes the pair mesh together too closely for comfort. And that appears to be the case with John Howard, proud cricket tragic and former Prime Minister of Australia who has been nominated as the Oceanic region’s next ICC leader, to take up the role as vice-president in a matter of days and to take the reins as president in two years.
First off, Howard’s career as Prime Minister is of as little relevance as the laughable opinion that he’s a racist for thinking that Muttiah Muralitharan chucks. It’s also true that the region, combining Australia and New Zealand as two of the sport’s most senior members, is well due an articulate, firm, and principled expert on cricket. None of which, I’m afraid, Mr. Howard is.
Indeed, the Kiwis can be forgiven for indignation that a far more qualified individual in their candidate Sir John Anderson, who has years of experience both as chairman of the New Zealand cricket board and of numerous other companies, has been passed off for little other reason than that he is a lower-profile character from a lower-profile country. When it came to choosing which man would receive the nomination, the meeting was chaired by allegedly neutral Australian businessman Sir Rod Eddington. On one side there was a man who had vast experience as a cricket and business administrator; on the other side there was a politician who would love to be able to hold a bat properly. A no-brainer was literally decided with no brains.
The only argument of any substance against Anderson can run that as he chairs Television New Zealand, he may have outside interests. But, really, that’s all, and his experience as a cricket administrator would have been invaluable, and very probably superceded his television motives. Howard, on the other hand, is a politician who–ignoring whatever controversy there was during his long stint as Australia’s Prime Minister–seems all too eager to rub off popular public opinions without a hint of restraint, gleefully branding Murali a chucker and going out of his way to forbid Australia from touring Zimbabwe.
The argument for Howard runs that he’s an alleged straight talker, and won’t be afraid to send that money-loaded subcontinental bloc with a flea in its ear. But that’s highly dubious; he has already made clear that India, the majordomo of the subcontinent, is to be soothed rather than scolded. And considering the cringeworthy haste with which he has always made his views on cricket (usually conveniently in step with popular Australian opinion) clear–at least John Major was tasteful about his fanhood–he is anything but a front-up straight talker.
And then there’s that bloc word again. It seems a convenient one, whichever “bloc” is using it to get one over the other. This time the allegedly cheating, bullying subcontinent finds itself on the receiving end, but it can easily veer either way; just years ago India was guilty of supporting Zimbabwe Cricket–backed, whether we like it or not, by the despicable Robert Mugabe–simply to get one over the non-Asian bloc. And, rather than avoid such pettiness, the non-Asian cricket world has been equally childish.
A case in point was the infamous 2006 Oval affair, when Pakistan walked out on Darrell Hair’s insinuations of cheating, and refused to participate under the controversial umpire again. Veteran writer Scyld Berry, who should have known better, decided to forgo the substance of the argument and wrote in the Times, “A most unfortunate precedent, however, has now been established. Any umpire who in future makes a decision which angers one of the Asian Test-playing countries — India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh — can expect the wrath of the Asian bloc to descend upon his head,” thereby turning Hair–right or wrong, an unacceptably haughty and abrasive official–into the poor honest straight-talker kicked out by the cash-wielding corrupt. All very convenient.
And there’s always that issue of chucking. It has little to do with Howard at the moment, but may almost certainly arise during any ICC official’s tenure and should therefore be swiftly laid to rest. Murali, Shoaib Akhtar, and others of the sort usually suffer the ignominy of having any achievement, however spectacular, cast under the cynical “chucking” label, simply to make a point. When a bowler, Asian or not, chucks, it should be firmly if discreetly dealt with. But the rule is, ignoring for a moment the 15-degree ICC sanction, that bowling with a bent elbow is chucking. The bent elbow gives an extra zip and jerk to the delivery, hence giving the bowler an unfair advantage. Murali, for one, has an unusually bent elbow to begin with, so whether or not he does induce that unfair jerk into his action–and the numerous studies all indicate otherwise–his elbow will remain bent all the same, giving the illusion of chucking even though it may be a perfectly normal delivery. But try explaining that to the bloc-criers, who ward off any argument with accusations of bribery and corruption without even a moment of consideration.
(”If it looks like a chuck it is one, 15 degrees or not,” goes the popular argument that the likes of Ross Emerson put forward, but if that had been the case legendary bowlers such as Fred Trueman were almost certainly chuckers. The 15-degree rule has not been made to accomodate Asian bowlers; it’s merely a measurement of the limits of any bowler.)
Leaving all that aside, Howard will need to tackle the formidable task not only of satisfying the current cricket fraternity, an onerous task in itself, but of spreading cricket to new communities. What he makes up for in boyish enthusiasm he lacks in experience, and it’s dubious whether the ICC will be roused from its customary stagnation. At the moment he has an opportunity at the side of Sharad Pawar–another politician, will we ever learn?–and if he wants to silence his doubters and make a move for cricket’s welfare, he’d better not take notes.
