Six and Out - Some Serious Cricket

Hair in debt again?

by SixandOut on February 7th, 2007

Just when you thought the cricketing world was just about getting back to normal again, things settling down nicely, England winning a couple of games, a thrilling series between Pakistan and South Africa under way, and the World Cup just around the corner, it felt like some of the controversies of last year, such as drugs bans and then first forfeiture of a game of cricket in 129 years had been conveniently forgotten, had been rightly swept under the carpet forgotten about. Well, Darrell Hair has put the kibosh on that by announcing that he’s now suing the ICC and the PCB, claiming that he had been discriminated against on the grounds of race. (You know, after it was widely suggested at the time of the event that he had discriminated against Pakistan on the grounds of race). It’s going to be very messy.

Hair said that he felt the PCB had induced the ICC to act discriminantly, considering that Billy Doctrove, the other umpire in the fateful match, got off totally scot free. Hair alleges it is because he is black. The PCB are typically incensed at the charges, although they do need to exercise caution when making statements, something they failed to do in the original instance which caused no end of confusion. Chairman of the PCB, Nashram Ashraf said:

This is adding insult to injury. Race has nothing to do with this.

(Radio 4)

Unfortunately for Dr Ashraf, race quite clearly has everything to do with this. The PCB (and most of the sub-continent) lauded Hair as a racist. Hair is now saying the ICC and the PCB are racist. It’s clearly a case of tit-for-tat, he-said, she-said, and it’s going to be an extremely difficult case for Hair to argue. (Maybe he should arrange for him, the PCB and the ICC to spend a week in the Big Brother house? That ought to hunt out any racist tendencies from the lot of them.)

Presumably the motivation for Hair here is to recover some of his integrity, something was considerably battered as a result of a Ovalgate, especially after he offered to resign from his job for the mere sum of $500k. Although presumably, were he to win this case, then the question of damages, and even lost earnings, would be at stake. Quite what has prompted Hair to bring the charges isn’t clear at the moment - it’s either the prospect of umpiring Bermuda for the rest of his career, or he’s either got a nasty gambling habit. What is clear, however, is that the ICC need to make a stand and wherever possible avoid the race question. The need to maintain their line that they had lost faith in his ability, even though I still believe he should have been given the boot full stop - not because I thought Hair was wrong, but that if the ICC really don’t want him umpiring, then he shouldn’t be umpiring at all, rather than palming him off to the associate members as they did.

Short of the ICC giving in and paying the $500k of the original request, though, he’s not Hair today gone tomorrow - this one’s going to be around for a while.

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POSTED IN: Cricket