LORD’S TEST FURORE!
By The Bug‘s resident cricket tragic
Thank goodness is all I can say for Lord’s Test third umpire Marais Erasmus!
At long last we have an international umpire prepared to reinstate the basic, fundamental tenet – nay, the very bedrock – of sound cricket umpiring as it should have forever been: the benefit of the doubt must always go with the batsman!
And that’s exactly what Erasmus has done in ruling that Mitchell Starc had not cleanly caught out England opener Ben Duckett late on day four of the second Ashes Test at Lord’s.
We can hold forums for ever more devoted to a forensic analysis of his reading of Law 33.3 of the gentleperson’s game – the act of making a catch shall start from the time when the ball first comes into contact with a fielder’s person and shall end when a fielder obtains complete control over both the ball and his/her own movement – but here’s the basics as Erasmus saw them: THE BALL TOUCHED THE FUCKING GRASS!”
Of course, I’m not pretending that the basic rule of benefit of the doubt to the batsman was once so sacrosant, so ingrained in the rules.
In my brilliant career now decades past, I lost count of the number of times I was given out LBW when the ball clearly would have missed leg stump. Sure, it would have knocked over middle and off but where was my right to a reprieve? It wasn’t as if I was going to last the rest of the over anyway.
But I digress. Starc was sliding sideways and did he have control of the ball? Maybe. Had he completed the catch. Hmmm. Would that ball have ever left Starc’s fist if it had not hit the ground? Ahhhh. Once again, here’s the clincher: none of those questions need answering because…..THE BALL TOUCHED THE FUCKING GRASS!
Just like it did on a couple of Cameron Green’s controversial snares of recent times, where his effort was given the green light. But regardless of how many fingers and toes Green had under the ball, guess what? THE BALL TOUCHED THE FUCKING GRASS!”
The laws of most sports are very logical, very clear and easy to administer.
And if I had ever become an international cricket umpire at the end of my non-Test, non-Sheffield Shied, non-Brisbane A grade career, I wouldn’t have really been bothered what Law 33.3 did or did not say about the tips of blades of grass. IF IT’S CLEAR THE BALL HAS TOUCHED ONE FUCKING BLADETIP OF GRASS, THEN THE BATSMAN IS NOT OUT!
How can I be so certain about this? Because former Australian fast bowler Glenn McGrath rated the Starc non-catch decision as “the biggest load of rubbish” he had ever seen.
In a daring mix of ultra hyperbole and illogical absurdity – which probably explains why he will be voting No! in The Voice referendum – McGrath declared on the BBC: “If that’s not out, every catch I’ve ever seen taken should not be out. That is a disgrace. I’ve seen everything. That is ridiculous.”
“Did the ground assist him catching the ball? Did him sliding aid the catch? It did not assist him, he had control of the ball.”
My final bit of advice for the likes of McGrath and Mitchell Starc’s fielding coach: “If you want to have a catch awarded: DON’T LET THE BALL TOUCH THE FUCKING GRASS! Okay?
I’d recommend they watch what Colin Cowdrey did at the Gabba once. He took a wonderful catch at slip, swung around with the rest of the slippers as if the ball had flown down to the boundary while at the same time squirrelling the pill into a trouser pocket. He then wisely left it there for some good solid seconds, just so the umpire could be in no doubt whatsoever that …. THE BALL DIDN’T TOUCH THE FUCKING GRASS!
On second thoughts, it might have been wise for Cowdrey to walk up to the bowler’s end and let the umpire take the ball out of his pocket, just in case he had missed what MCC had done. All of us under the fig trees on the eastern side of the ground certainly missed his magic moment of sleight-of-hand brilliance.
Don Gordon-Brown
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