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Andrew Strauss ‘is a pommy cheat’
How the England cricket captain claimed a dubious catch and set the blogosphere alight
Does England have a cheat for a cricket captain? It looks like it to thousands of cricket fans and bloggers - and not just Australians - after England's Andrew Strauss claimed a catch off Aussie batsman Phil Hughes at Lord's on Sunday.
For non-cricket fans, all you need to know is this: out on the field, without the benefit of TV replays, it is sometimes impossible for the umpires to tell whether a fielder has caught a ball cleanly when the catch is very close to the ground.
Only the fielder himself knows the answer and this sport of gentlemen depends on that fielder telling the truth. As much as he might want to claim the wicket, if he knows in his heart of hearts that he did not catch the ball cleanly - that it possibly touched the ground before nestling securely in his fingers - then he must confess.
What happened on Sunday was that the England bowler Andrew Flintoff thundered in with his 90mph-plus delivery and the Aussie left-hander Phil Hughes flicked the ball out to Strauss in the slips. The ball was clearly going to fall short of Strauss by a couple of feet. But he stretched himself forward, grabbed the ball as it hit the grass - or a nanosecond before it hit the grass, depending on your point of view - and claimed the catch.
Hughes turned round and asked Strauss if he had caught it fair and square. When Strauss nodded yes, Hughes did the gentlemanly thing and began to walk towards the pavilion. But his captain Ricky Ponting, who was batting at the opposite end, told him to wait. He was convinced it was not a catch. The umpires conferred with themselves and the players. Strauss insisted he had caught it. The umpires had little choice but to take his word for it and Hughes was judged out.
The enigmatic Strauss then stood on his spot, acting as if there were no controversy while - without his knowledge - Sky TV played and replayed the moment. It seemed clear that Strauss was wrong to have claimed it. The TV commentators - all of them former cricketers - were loathe to say anything definitive. Only David Lloyd pronounced: "This will be like The Mousetrap. This will run and run." And how right he was.
Within hours the footage was playing on YouTube, apparently showing the ball touching the grass before Strauss wrapped his hungry fingers around it. A balloon caption read: "I'm a cheating unwashed pommy bastard."
The trouble is, even some Englishmen are agreeing with that sentiment this morning. An MCC member who witnessed the scene told The First Post: "Honestly, I hope Australia win on Monday. Strauss should be relieved of the captaincy." ·
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Personally can't see the difference between this catch and hundreds of others where the batsman has not even hit the ball and been given out!! Cheating is endemic in cricket and every other sport played at a high level and for Australians who invented sledging to complain about dubious decisions is ironic given the umpiring at Cardiff where not a single LBW shout was given to England !! Just rub of the green as far as i could see.
Its just not cricket!!!
There is absolutely no doubt that it was not a clean catch and Strauss' only defence against the cheating allegation is that he did not think the ball hit the ground. However having played club cricket for 30 years I know that the fielder in such a situation always knows if the ball hits the ground. Strauss must have known and should therefore be banned from all cricket for say a year, fined a very large amount for such blatant cheating and be stripped of the captaincy permanently. I love it when England occasionally beat the Aussies but I would rather they lost than cheat their way to victory. On behalf of all honest and fair England cricket fans I would like to apologise to Ricky Ponting and his team for Strauss' behaviour and I very much hope that if Strauss continues in the team, the Aussies retain the Ashes.
Well said Peter, the umpire made a decision and players should abide by that decision.
Australia would do the same so I don't think there is any point in querying the Umpire's decision. It is unsporting, ungentlemanly and very wrong to criticise the umpire's decision.
It seems clear it was not a clear catch. That does not mean Strauss was cheating, our perceptions are often wrong and it possible he was sure he had caught it cleanly... the meaning of "ground"** is not clear and from his angle it would have been difficult in any case. Unfortunatley, on top of the 1st test time wasting ( when interviewed Strauss was not convincing) and Atherton's dust in pocket incident, it doesn't look good. .................................................
** is it when the ball touches the tip of a fast growing weed or what?