Cricket Diary: Departing Cronje leaves calling cards (22 Aug 1998)

22 August 1998

Cricket Diary: Departing Cronje leaves calling cards

Compiled by Clive Ellis

DESPITE the sense of injustice which accompanied South Africa's Test series defeat, captain Hansie Cronje goes home believing that the onus should be on players to keep up the standards rather than whingeing about umpires.

Cronje foresees cricket taking a leaf out of football and rugby's disciplinary book with the introduction of red and yellow cards to punish recalcitrant batsmen and bowlers.

"The umpires' job has to be made easier by forcing the players to be honest," said Cronje, who has been asked to submit a report on umpiring standards to the United Cricket Board in South Africa.

Under his proposals, which Cronje hopes to "sell" to his fellow international captains, batsmen who linger when clearly out could be banned for two matches and bowlers who appeal excessively would be shown the yellow card for the first offence and red for any subsequent transgression.

South Africa, meanwhile, are set to pioneer the extension of the third umpire's duties in their domestic competitions this autumn to incorporate bat-pad decisions.

PERHAPS television replays do not show the whole picture after all.

Cliff Hardcastle, chairman of the Kent engineering firm Densitron International, suggests that when bowlers are operating at speeds of up to 90mph even super slow-motion cameras cannot show definitively if the ball hits a hand or bat.

The fastest camera, Mr Hardcastle points out, takes pictures at 150 per second and the ball travels more than 10in between pictures.

"The TV pundits' analysis of umpiring decisions is totally and fatally flawed," he writes. "Even in super slow motion, it will not and cannot show whether the ball hits anything between pictures."

HAMPSHIRE scorer Vic Isaacs was not a happy man at Portsmouth last weekend as the prospect of a magical statistical moment came to naught.

Robin Smith, Matthew Keech, Alex Morris, Dimitri Mascarenhas and Giles White had all passed 50 against Essex and with Kevan James poised on 49 not out it seemed inevitable that, after five examples of five players reaching fifty in an innings, there would be the first instance of six making the grade in Hampshire's history.

Peter Hartley's co-operation was lacking, however, as he holed out at long on, leaving James high and dry on 49 and Isaacs very discontent.

WHAT do Dickie Bird and Stephen King have in common?

Well, one is a best-selling author and the other is THE best-selling author in the world, and both are under the publishing wing of Hodder and Stoughton.

Bird, whose My Autobiography is claimed to be the most successful sports autobiography in history, selling 335,000 copies, will introduce American horror writer King to the intricacies of cricket at Trent Bridge tomorrow.

King is making his first visit to Britain for 20 years to promote his latest novel, Bag of Bones.

IAN AUSTIN was delayed in answering England's SOS at the weekend, because he was selected for a drugs test at the Roses match at Headingley.

Austin was informed of his call-up just before lunch on Saturday, but it took him until nearer teatime before he could produce a sample and set off to join his England team-mates.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)