Match referees have different yardsticks

ONCE again the International Cricket Council is in the firing line and this time it will do well to address the issue than sweep it under the carpet as has been the case all these years.

The episode involving six Indian cricketers and Mike Denness leaves none in doubt that the match referee was on a mission. I don't know if he was wanting to prove some point but he was a complete misfit in the seat of match referee.

Denness was unfair in judging the conduct of the cricketers on the field. It was shocking that he saw only one team bringing disrepute to the game. That is what he thinks because I don't believe any Indian cricketer indulged in any act which would invite such harsh punishments.

I have said earlier in my column and would like to repeat that this ICC is a body which is meek. It has no guts to set things right and the happenings in South Africa have shown the ICC in very poor light. After all, it was ICC which appointed a biased man like Denness as match referee.

For years we in the Indian team have suffered at the hands of various match referees. I wouldn't like to point fingers at an individual because they collectively have failed in their duties. How can a match referee be blind when dealing with some teams and get excited to book some players from the other team?

I would specifically like to mention the case of Michael Slater here when he showed dissent on the field during the India-Australia series. Slater took on the home umpire, S. Venkataraghavan in full view of everyone and what did the match referee do? He just ignored the incident. It showed that Cammie Smith, the match referee, was a misfit for the job if he was not going to protect the umpires. And what did the ICC do? It did nothing. It just sat on the issue.

Like I said the match referees have different yardsticks to be applied when dealing with dissent and bad behaviour on the field. During India's last visit to Australia, the match referee, Ranjan Madugalle, very nicely ignored the misdeeds of the home players even as he came down heavily on the Indian players. He was not consistent at all. But the Indians took it lying down.

I remember when India visited South Africa in 1996 there were quite a few incidents which showed the match referee in extremely poor light. There was this incident when Allan Donald exploded on the field with a verbal assault after Rahul Dravid deposited one of his deliveries into the crowd at mid-wicket. I could well understand Dravid choosing to ignore it by looking the other way but could the match referee, Barry Jarman, adopt a similar policy?

The Indian camp has every right to feel let down by the match referees who come from various backgrounds. The heavy bias against the Indian team has been very prominent in the past few years. It is like a hidden agenda to book the Indian cricketers and let off the ones from teams like Australia, South Africa and England.

It was incredible that Denness found a gentleman like Sachin Tendulkar a cheat. The match referee slapped a fine on him for trying to tamper with the ball without realising the damage he was causing to the image of the game itself. Tendulkar is an icon, a living legend and an impeccable ambassador of the game. What point was Denness trying to prove by calling Tendulkar a cheat? His ruling amounted to labelling Tendulkar a cheat.

I would like to know in the first place how could the ICC appoint someone like Denness to the important job of match referee. Is he trying to tell us that the Indian cricketers on the field were all misbehaving and working towards bringing disrepute to the game? What were the South Africans doing? What was Andre Nel saying to Sourav Ganguly during the tri-series? What was Shaun Pollock doing with that bullish appeal which ultimately compelled the umpire to give V. V. S. Laxman out? And what was the match referee doing when the South Africans were letting out abuses at the Indian batsmen?

The ICC itself has done little to check the deterioration in on-field behaviour of the players. By appointing biased match referees the ICC has allowed the errant players to get away and in the process encouraged the others to indulge in similar bad behaviours. It is appalling that that Nel and Pollock were judged differently by this man who penalised six Indians for various 'offences'. They were offences in Denness' opinion and not in the opinion of a majority.

Why is that the Indians alone are often found guilty of bad behaviour? Some of these match referees may put the Sri Lankans and Pakistanis also in the same league but the Indians seem to be marked. Look at how they have punished Ganguly repeatedly and let go people like Glenn McGrath, Damien Fleming, Slater, Pollock, Donald.....The point I am trying to make is that India, as a team, is being targeted by these match referees and that is not good for the game.

It is time the gutless ICC stood up and puts a stop to this bias. The game would be better off without bad behaviour on the field. The traditions of the game and the spirit of the game should be protected, no doubt. But then the game would be much better off without match referees like Mike Denness. In my opinion, he has, with his biased rulings, done enough to bring disrepute to the game. The ICC owes the cricketing fraternity a better administration and the conduct of the game would certainly improve if it appoints competent men as match referees.