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Cricket: ODIs Aren’t Proper Cricket Edition


Hereward

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I love how the media are - justifiably - seething about how Lehman is still coach. Putrid, appalling and disgusting.

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A quote from Sutherland when he axed Mickey Arthur:

Quote

Discipline, consistency of behaviour and accountability of performance are all key ingredients that need to improve. And we see that the head coach is ultimately responsible for that.

And yet here we are, with Lehmann still firmly ensconced as coach. 

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I think eventually we'll see the other dominoes topple, Lehmann won't be in place for much longer. it's a long time in between drinks from this Test series to the next, I don't see him being able to last that jump.

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The bans seem reasonable to me, though I'd be shocked if Warner ever plays again, and if Smith is ever captain again. But Lehman escaping and the insistence that none of the bowlers even knew are still hard  to accept.

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When this whole thing broke I thought the bans would be about a year long. Hits them in the pocket, too - can't play IPL, they'll lose their sponsors.

Bancroft off more lightly and gets to play the summer (assuming he gets picked).

I think (and hope) Warner never plays again, I expect Smith will come straight back into the side, especially with an Ashes series looming soon after his return.

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Yeah, I agree. The bans do seem fair enough. I think Cricket Australia has dealt with that part pretty well.

Other than that I don’t know about whether the bowlers were involved but, as everyone’s saying, Lehman escaping sanction seems a little odd.

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10 minutes ago, The Winged Shadow said:

Pretty sure he got the job by default because no other senior player in the team at the time.

Yeah, Warner got it by default because there weren't any other batsmen who could reliably hold down a place in the side. Consider the current lineup of Khawaja, the Marsh brothers and Bancroft - it doesn't really smack of permanency, and it's been that way for years (Handscomb, Renshaw, Burns etc).

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Supposedly there is sandpaper in the dressing rooms for people who obsess and want to fiddle around with their bats.

Warner really deserves to be in the poo. As the charges suggest, not only did he mastermind the plan, but he deliberately concealed his involvement in it, and was only found out by the investigation. Not once has he fronted the media or made a statement about it (unlike Smith or Bancroft) or even owned up to being involved at all.

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1 hour ago, The Winged Shadow said:

Pretty sure he got the job by default because no other senior player in the team at the time.

Being long in tooth and having a pulse are piss-poor qualifications for leadership, as this episode has amply demonstrated. Literally everyone who signed on to that decision should be shown the door for rank stupidity.

(I'm not suggesting that you're supporting this farce -- just venting into the air at the tawdriness of it all. JFC.)

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Getting caught.

It's a very fine line between "working on the ball" and "ball tampering". The latter probably happens more often than people would like to think although bringing a foreign object onto the field to alter the ball would be more rare. Usually tampering involves something more subtle like sweets to alter saliva, sunblock, vaseline, deliberately throwing the ball on the square to rough it up etc.   It's actually very difficult for these things to be picked up on. Lets not forget that in this particular case it was only because Fanie de Villiers was suspicious about the Aussies getting reverse swing before the 30th over and informed the cameraman to follow the ball. Bancroft was caught after an hour-and-a-half of the cameraman doing this. 

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41 minutes ago, Consigliere said:

Getting caught.

It's a very fine line between "working on the ball" and "ball tampering". The latter probably happens more often than people would like to think although bringing a foreign object onto the field to alter the ball would be more rare. Usually tampering involves something more subtle like sweets to alter saliva, sunblock, vaseline, deliberately throwing the ball on the square to rough it up etc.   It's actually very difficult for these things to be picked up on. Lets not forget that in this particular case it was only because Fanie de Villiers was suspicious about the Aussies getting reverse swing before the 30th over and informed the cameraman to follow the ball. Bancroft was caught after an hour-and-a-half of the cameraman doing this. 

I thought as much. This made the news in the States too. 

Doctoring a baseball is done the same way. Usually vaseline in the bill of the cap, or pine tar on the inside of belt for grip. Tobacco spit is used too, or of course a bit of sandpaper on the thumb. 

Dirt is the only thing you're allowed to use all the time. You can't even blow into your hands unless it's cold. 

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Let’s be clear though. It is not that common to, in a single incident:

1. Bring a foreign object on to the field to gain an advantage.

2. Exercise a captain and vice-captain’s undue influence on a junior player to gain an unfair advantage.

3. Deceive the umpires (and the public) when questioned/caught out in the attempt to gain an advantage.

4. Form the plan to gain an unfair advantage in a premeditated way, free from the spontaneity of on-field action.

It’s the combination of these aggravating factors, and the reflection they provide on an already rotten existing team culture, that have spurred the public reaction. Not the ball tampering itself. If Warner or Bancroft had been merely picking at the seam or rubbing dirt on the ball independent of these factors, we have a very different story.

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12 hours ago, Hereward said:

The bans seem reasonable to me, though I'd be shocked if Warner ever plays again, and if Smith is ever captain again. But Lehman escaping and the insistence that none of the bowlers even knew are still hard  to accept.

I wonder if there's a certain amount of plausible deniability going on. If a bowler noticed that after the ball kept going to Bancroft then it started reverse swinging more than usual then he might not be inclined to ask too many question about exactly how that happened.

I can't see how Lehman stays regardless of whether or not he knows about it in advance.

I agree the bans seem reasonable given their behaviour.

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13 hours ago, Jeor said:

I think eventually we'll see the other dominoes topple, Lehmann won't be in place for much longer. it's a long time in between drinks from this Test series to the next, I don't see him being able to last that jump.

I have no idea how they possibly let him off. Apparently he said, "What the f*** is going on?!" or something. This apparently proved he wasn't in the know. Which I disagree with because it could just as easily mean, "What the hell is going on? How come you're being so obvious about this?"

Coupled with the fact this is still being treated as a one-off, when it clearly isn't after the Ashes, Lehman should be gone.

12 hours ago, Hereward said:

The bans seem reasonable to me, though I'd be shocked if Warner ever plays again, and if Smith is ever captain again. But Lehman escaping and the insistence that none of the bowlers even knew are still hard  to accept.

If anything they should be longer. People bet on these games, so corrupting the result is so unbelievably far-reaching beyond mere integrity of rules.

 

8 hours ago, Arch-MaesterPhilip said:

Is doctoring the ball uncommon in cricket? Or is getting caught?

No. Australians will now like to say that it is, to lessen how bad this was. But it is not especially common, which is why it makes news when it happens. There have been instances of ball tampering before, of course. The penalties are not particularly harsh, though. The standard ban from the ICC is one match.

16 minutes ago, williamjm said:

I can't see how Lehman stays regardless of whether or not he knows about it in advance.

If he wasn't in on it then he isn't intelligent enough to be coach, as he didn't notice it happening, or he isn't trustworthy, since the players don't feel close enough to ask him about it. Either way, terrible coach.

And that's assuming he didn't know, and I reckon he did.

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