[QUOTE=mamboman]
Firstly, sir, welcome to the wonderful confraternity which is cricket. It’s a a marvellous, fascinating and rich game and I am glad for you and or us that you found your way to it.
I could not let the comment on Muralitharan pass however. I am most definitely in the camp that the man is a charlatan. His action is a travesty and he should have been thrown out of cricket many years ago.
Bob Woolmer’s death is an appalling, appalling event. I hope they quickly catch the sonsofbotches that killed him.
Go Aussies!
mm
[/QUOTE]
Actually, not a sir, but a ma’am, I suppose. (although I like to think I am too young for that title yet)
And I wouldn’t begin to argue about Muralitharan, not knowing what I would be talking about. I can say that whatever his “action” is, it was very noticeably different than any of the other bowlers I had seen that day. I remember thinking if I was a batsman, I would rather anyone else bowl to (?) at (?) me than him. So if my uneducated eye could see something quite different about him, I can understand how there could be controversy about him.
I find this side discussion started here very interesting. And I am glad to know that should I happen to meet any other cricket fans, expressing an opinion on Muralitharan might start a heated debate, which I would not intend, so I am glad this has come up now.
And the other side story, the death of the coach and rumors of betting scams are reminding me a bit of my favorite sport, horseracing. That was one parallel I was not expecting to find. Although in racing it is the horse who is found dead under suspicious circumstances, or the competition suspected of drugging a horse pre-race, or jockeys taking the bribes. And similar to horseracing, it seems the only time cricket would make the national news here is because of suspected corruption or tragedy.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0703240093mar24,1,5787812.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed
……….“In a sport generally associated with white trousers, green lawns, cut-glass accents and breaks for “teatime,” the news of Woolmer’s apparent murder is a stunner, but passions run deep in the world of international cricket, especially on the Indian subcontinent where it is a rough-and-tumble sport followed avidly by the masses.
After the loss to Ireland, which eliminated Woolmer’s team from the tournament, irate fans in Pakistan demanded the arrest of the coach. Mobs gathered in the streets to chant “Death to Bob Woolmer” while burning his effigy.
When India, another cricket powerhouse, lost to Bangladesh earlier this week, fans attacked the home of a star player who failed to live up to expectations.
In addition to fanatical fans, the game has a shabby underside of gamblers, match fixing and performance-enhancing drugs. Two of Pakistan’s players were banned from competition earlier this year after failing drug tests.”…………..
I would not have suspected something like this in cricket, thinking racing had the monopoly on gamblers, race fixing and performance-enhancing drugs.
I saw that the Scottish gentlemen did not meet their goal of beating the Netherlands. They are getting quite a beating now in some forums by disappointed fans. The captain, one of the players I met, resigned. That also leaves me feeling a bit sad, as he and the other players and team manager I met were all great ambassadors for cricket, most definitely excited and proud to representing Scotland in the World Cup. I hate that even with their low expectations that they are disappointed in how things turned out.
Oh well, on to the Super Eight (our college basketball tournament just finished its “Elite Eight” games.) matches……