Years ago, 'Mad' magazine featured a cartoon strip in which tennis
maestro Bjorn Borg was captioned happy, angry, dejected, worried and
charged up in different frames. In an obvious dig at the Swede's
monumental calm on court, the artist had portrayed him wearing the
same expression in each of the frames. In sharp contrast, Jimmy
Connors and John McEnroe rewrote the code of player conduct,
especially the latter who set world records in unseemly tantrums on
the tennis court.
Around the same time, cricket was taking its first tentative steps
away from being the gentleman's game, players beginning to demonstrate
their feelings on the field of play. Indian crowds had their taste of
on-field gamesmanship when Tony Greig used mildly intimidatory tactics
towards batsmen and umpires, at the same time winning the crowds over
with his friendly antics. Elsewhere, the Australians were inventing
the 'art' of sledging in a throwback to what giants of the past like
Dr WG Grace and Warwick Armstrong had practised a long time ago. Years
later, Sunil Gavaskar, given out lbw, tried to walk off the field with
his partner Chetan Chauhan in mid-Test match, apparently frustrated by
what he felt had been persistently poor umpiring against India. In
another Test match, Dennis Lillee and Javed Miandad nearly came to
blows. These were spontaneous reactions to explosive situations, but
orchestrated misbehaviour was to become the norm in subsequent
decades.
'Tiger' Pataudi, the former Indian captain, who equalled Borg in his
unemotional demeanour on the cricket ground, once said in a TV
interview that he welcomed the spontaneous show of feelings by players
today. In his own days, Prasanna and Bedi had started the trend of
giving unbridled expression to their joy at each other's success. The
West Indians had introduced the high fives, an essential part today of
cricket from kindergarten to international. I don't believe however
that the former Nawab approved of the overt aggression, verbal abuse
and ugly gestures which have become part and parcel of the
contemporary game. The ICC referees are beginning to exert authority
in this respect, albeit selectively in favour of players of some
privileged countries.
Bowlers and fielders look comical when they go into convulsions of
celebration of a rare success after the batsmen have hammered them to
all parts of the field and the scoreboard reads 300 for 2. But even
more vulgar and objectionable is the sight of a bowler showing rude
signs or pointing the way to the pavilion when he gets the better of a
batsman. This sends out wrong signals to budding cricketers watching
the game, as it is their natural tendency to imitate their heroes.
I find equally appalling the ridiculous appealing most teams indulge
in nowadays, even when they know there is no chance of getting a
verdict in their favour. Not only does needless appealing prejudice
the umpire against the guilty player, it shows the player in a poor
light, casting doubts on his IQ more than his integrity.
As for flagrant aggro specifically directed at opponents, such conduct
only serves to remind us of man's ancestry as traced by Charles
Darwin. It is time the ICC directed match referees to stamp out onfield bad behaviour, without playing favourites.