The game must not lightly give in to terror

Kevin Pietersen, on his way back home, at the Bangalore airport.-AP

When the smoke clears and the dust settles cricket may regret the haste with which bags have been packed and matches cancelled, writes Peter Roebuck.

Although cricket matters little in these times of trouble, still the game must fashion a considered response to the outrage that unfolded in Mumbai. Amidst the fury and sorrow and the blood and the smoke it is tempting to give license to anger, tempting to exaggerate the danger. Flames and bodies and shocked faces can be flashed around the world in an instant and their impact is lasting.

In a trice an entire city can seem to be under siege, an entire country can seem to be living behind barricades. A single blast, an evil hour or a devilish day can cripple a nation. Thus evil achieves its ends. After all the aim has been to bring an end to happiness.

But it is foolish to over-react, foolish to suppose that threats lurk around every corner and that normal life must be abandoned and everything put on high alert. Life cannot go along that way. Even now it is more dangerous to catch a tuc tuc or drive to Jaipur than to stay in a posh hotel in Mumbai let alone anywhere else in the country. Danger cannot be determined by pictures, only by odds. Planes crash every week.

Doubtless it sounds cold but it is a reality. Even now cricketers are more likely to contract cholera in Bulawayo or get mugged in Durban than to suffer in India.

When the smoke clears and the dust settles cricket may regret the haste with which bags have been packed and matches cancelled. Of course it was too much to expect foreigners to play the game in Mumbai within a few days or even weeks of the terrible events that have occurred.

Apart from anything else the way westerners were singled out sent a chilling message. But Colaba is not Mumbai and Mumbai is not India. Cricket must not lightly give in to terror or allow emotion to replace analysis in its collective mind. Otherwise the enemy will achieve the paralysis it seeks.

Other venues can be found. Timings can be changed. Security can be tightened. Whenever possible the game must go on, as it did in London after the underground bombings of 2005, as it has done in times of war. Some theatres stayed open during the Blitz.

Many entertainers have flown to war zones to bring give some temporary relief to those in the firing line. Obviously it’s more complicated when the nation itself is not under attack, when the enemy is within. But the same principle applies. If at all possible the show must go on. All too often cricket has fled the scene, with World Cup matches cancelled in Africa and Sri Lanka, and tours of the subcontinent put off.

Cricket has canned the wrong tour. India has been assaulted by a bunch of well organised evil doers. Regardless of the security in place, it could happen anywhere. Indeed it has happened in many places. Contrastingly Zimbabwe is ruled by sickening despots intent on killing opponents and plundering the coffers. A nation starves, hospitals and schools close, life expectancy falls to 32 and still India backs the incumbents. Still the Sri Lanka tour goes ahead. It is hypocrisy of the highest order.

Indian cricket will survive. Money talks. But the game is dying on its feet. At present teams are reluctant to play in India or Pakistan or Sri Lanka, and ought not to appear in Zimbabwe.

Already reduced by those who supposedly love it to little more than a wing of show business and mutual enrichment, this most unmanageable of games is dying on its feet. Conscience left the building a long time ago and now it looks like nerve has also been lost.