Umpires given three years to acquire their thick skin (1 Apr 1997)

Tuesday 1 April 1997

Playing the Part: Umpires given three years to acquire their thick skin

By Lewine Mair

BOB Bannell says that the cricketer whose playing days have come to an end has two choices: either he can take up golf or he can put something back into cricket. "And if," adds this official of some 40 years standing, "he decides on the cricket option, the only way he can do it is to do it properly."

Bannell notes, tongue in cheek, that not everyone has enough handkerchiefs to be a Dickie Bird and that there are, in any case, plenty of people who only want to officiate at club level.

He himself is among the 80 to 90 officials on the Surrey panel of umpires and is currently their chairman. By way of qualifying for such a panel, the men and women (there are two women in the Surrey set-up of the moment) must attend seminars in their area and sit an examination which consists of two written papers and an oral.

Having mastered the theory, they are then expected to spend three years in the field, umpiring recreational cricket. Only then can they become fully-fledged members of the Association of Cricket Umpires and Scorers.

Further progress, if any, will depend on marks received from week to week in the Surrey championship. It is the captains who do the marking and, at the end of the season, the 10 umpires who come out on top can, if they so wish, be put forward for consideration for county second XI games at the Oval, where they will work in tandem with a first-class umpire. As likely as not, the first-class umpire will be an ex-county cricketer, who may or may not have sat his exams.

Incidentally, the fact that captains carry on marking the umpires at the more elevated strata is a state of affairs which, to Bannell`s way of thinking, paves the way for these worthies to get away with murder. "The question I`d like to ask," he said, "is how often do you see a county captain given out lbw?"

Bannell, who himself played London club cricket, says it is not crucial for an umpire to have been a reasonable player; only preferable. The reason, here, is that the person who has played the game well will usually have a better instinct for the game and circumstance.

The playing factor apart, he will tell you that an umpire needs "a strong bladder" and a "thick skin".

With regard to the strong bladder, Bannell, 75, recalls afternoons in the Surrey championship, in which he has taken the field at 1.30pm and still been there - without any kind of break - after 5.30pm.

"Yes," he said, "of course you could say `excuse me` and run. The only trouble is that the players wouldn`t like it. Though it`s fine for them to want to leave the field for a few minutes - they`re usually after a leak and a fag - they`d certainly be critical, if you were to do the same.

"They are always wanting to make out that an umpire`s decisions are dodgy, to be critical of one thing or another, and this would merely be giving them more ammunition." There are times, he said, when he had had fingers "and everything else" crossed and prayed for rain.

THE thick skin is needed to deal with the awkward customers "who have an attitude problem towards umpires in general". Hardly surprisingly, Bannell said that it helped if the umpires and other officials were all on the same side; acting, as it were, as a "third team".

Bannell and his colleagues umpire because they love cricket. Certainly, there is no financial incentive. Those on the Surrey panel receive 13.50 in expenses for a match in the Surrey championship. When it comes to the county second XI games, that figure goes up to 32 per day.

For Bannell, the strangest goings-on in a game of cricket occurred at a Weybridge v Cobham match of a couple of seasons ago. Cobham were batting and the incident began with the striker hitting the ball to deep mid-off and starting to run.

Meantime, down the other end of what was a sodden and slippery pitch, the bowler had become entangled with the nonstriker. Adding to the mayhem was the fact that the fielder was returning the ball in their direction.

When the non-striker, now on his feet, saw it coming, he turned round and kicked it over the boundary.

Bannell, in response to an appeal from the fielders, agreed that he was "obstructing the field" and gave him out. At this, the other batsman took umbrage, demolishing the wicket before walking off with his colleague.

"What now?" the rest asked of Bannell. The umpire suggested they wait and see if the second player would return with the next batsman. He did not and, as you would expect, the pair were on the receiving end of a severe reprimand from on high.

Ask Bannell for his pet hates and the first that comes to mind - and he is not troubled if anyone should think he is being unnecessarily pedantic - is the way in which television commentators, with the exception of Richie Benaud, insist on calling the pitch the wicket.

"You hear them asking, `What`s the wicket doing today?` and the answer to that is that the wicket`s not doing anything."

Contact address for anyone interested in becoming a cricket umpire or scorer: Graham Bullock, The administration manager, PO Box 399, Camberley, Surrey GU 16 52J. Tel 01276 27962

Publication: Cricket Umpiring and Scoring, by Tom Smith, with foreword by Colin Cowdrey (Weidenfeld and Nicolson; 6).

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