Indian Cricket Tour Controversy

I have to put in my two cents worth regarding this controversy about India pulling out of the final two tests. Again, this is another incident of how the media can blow things up so big that it then causes the poeple involved to react and make it bigger.

What is the actual controversy? Is it the racism issue with Harbhajan? Is it that Australia won again with some dubious umpiring? It's probably a combination of the two things that had got the Indians fuming. Losing tends to have that effect. I wonder what would have happened had India won. Should Australia then kick up a fuss.

Firstly to the racism issue with Harbhajan. We will never know if Harbhajan said racist comments to Symonds. I don't see why the Australians would bring that up for no reason. I will admit that they sledge quite a bit, so why would they have to change from that and resort to this. And it's not Harbhajan's record is very clean. He may be incited, but he could easily sledge back with a million other things. This is the nature of the sport, like it or not.

The second issue of Australia not playing "in the spirit of the game", I think that is unfair too. Sport is played with as much heart as one can, and the Australians do that. The fact that some umpiring decisions went their way this test happens to everyone. If there was perfect umpiring decisions all the time, that would be called a computer game. You get some calls your way, you don't some other days. You can't blame Australia for that. You can say that the Australians pressured the umpire, but so does any other team. Some Indian batsmen stood their ground when they were clearly caught and did not leave. Should that be seen as not playing in the spirit of the game too.

And how can you deny a team from celebrating. For goodness sakes, you've toiled for five days and come away with an amazing victory. What are you going to do, just stand there. This is sport played at its toughest. Not many sporting events drag on for five days. It's only natural to celebrate a win so monumental. NBA players celebrate a slam dunk with as much vigour, why aren't they chastised. If you want genteel, go and watch golf or lawn bowls. Even in golf when something big happens, there fist pumping and shouting.

India's threat to pull out of the tour is just blackmail. They carry so much power in the cricket system and are now using their power to get what they want. They already have Bucknor removed from the next match and want Harbhajan's suspension to be removed. If the ICC bow to that completely, then it throws the whole system into chaos. Who can listen to anything the judicial system imposes if one can just change it by throwing some weight around.

As for calls for Ricky Ponting to be sacked, that's such a laughable suggestion. What has Ponting done to deserve that. All of a sudden, one sporting match has spoiled a whole countries reputation. Isn't that a bit of a overstatement?

If people want sport to be fair and played in the spirit, they shouldn't watch it. Sport nowadays is all about money and marketing. Without financial support and gain from companies, no sporting events would happen. This means all people relying on sport for their income, must do everything they can to succeed. No one remembers second place. All sportsmen are guilty of some arrogance. It's just that when it comes from the winners, it seen as being worse. People love to cut tall poppies down. It's just the natural way that human behaviour dictates we behave. How can we move up unless the ones above us fall down.