Overreacting to Molehills

It's been 3 days since the India-Australia Test at Sydney got over, but the furore over the events during the match simply refuses to subside. I suppose you could call this a good thing, what with Test cricket getting such passionate attention after a prolonged spell of unpopularity, but that would be being optimistic in the extreme. You know what else has been extreme? The knee-jerk and unreasonable reactions to the whole unfortunate episode. I'm sorry, but threatening to boycott a cricket tour because of a couple of bad umpiring decisions and a harsh sentence for an allegedly racist remark is going WAY overboard. I wonder if the series would have been in as much jeopardy as it is now if India had managed to save the Test?

The media has been every bit as excessive in its assessment of the affair as the boycott-happy Indian cricket board. The Times of India has been particularly boisterous in its coverage of the episode, first calling for the result of the Test to be annulled and then proceeding to devote headline after headline (and editorials too) to the threatened tour. Perhaps someone should tell the guys up at The Times of India that if the result of every Test match that suffered from umpiring errors was annulled, there would barely be more than a couple of Test results in the sub-continent in the 80's and early 90's. Umpiring errors, specially when they come from non-biased umpires (Steve Bucknor and Mark Benson are both 'neutral' umpires; they have almost no connection with Australia or Australian cricket) have to be taken with a pinch of salt; there's nothing much you can do about them until the ICC and the cricketing world in general realize the importance of bringing technology into all decisions on the cricket field. So much for level-headed common sense.

As far as the 'bad sportsmanship' of the Australian cricketers is concerned, I'd like to know when the Aussies have ever been a saintly group of sweet-talkers. The Kangaroos have been known to be past masters at sledging, or 'mental disintegration' as Steve Waugh liked to euphemistically put it, and if the rest of the cricketing world could tolerate their nonsense for a whole decade, then why the hue and cry all of a sudden? The English and their 'jellybeans' tactics hadn't attracted half as fierce a backlash as the Aussies have in this Test, which makes me really wonder whether it's just human nature to revel in the foibles of the mighty and the powerful. And puh-lease, since when has claiming half volley catches become a criminal offense? Nearly every player in the world has done it at some point of his career, and while that doesn't make it any less distasteful, it certainly does raise a few questions about the indignant reactions to Michael Clarke's catch to dismiss Sourav Ganguly (which, incidentally, wasn't even proven to be conclusively illegal).

The Harbhajan Singh-Andrew Symonds spat was a serious issue, I'll admit, but wouldn't a straightforward motion for an appeal (which is all the Indian management was left to do eventually anyway) have sufficed, rather than the dramatic boycott threats and disturbingly grave statements that the BCCI so foolishly indulged in? Ah, theatrics! How we love to honour thee! Ok, maybe that was a little cheesy, but I really am at pains to understand why the media and the Indian cricket board have made such a big issue out of this matter. It was only a cricket match, after all - a cricket match in which a few decisions unfortunately and unwittingly decided the course of the match, but also a cricket match in which one team lost because it couldn't survive an over of part-time left-arm spin. Perhaps it would do the Indian team a whole lot of good if its management spent half as much time and effort as it did in attacking the umpiring and refereeing in the match into teaching its bowlers how to hold a bat.

When 'Nothing' Becomes News

Beep, beep. Ridiculous Celebrity Headline alert. Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai are engaged! Now isn't this the most groundbreaking piece of news imaginable! Front-page material, most definitely. George W. Bush's ingenious insurge plans (or is that insurgency?) and Noida's serial killer/cannibal can be comfortably pushed to page two. Yes, the Abhi-Ash engagement deserves the hugest media attention - every newspaper must devote at least half of its front page to the critical event, and news channels must unhesitatingly unleash the exact painstaking details about the entire episode as their 'top story'. After all, every single Indian, and many non-Indians too, are going to be deeply affected by this earth-shattering development and so, of course, it's the media's sacred duty to keep them thoroughly well-informed.

Are you kidding me? Who cares that two of the most publicity-hungry individuals in the country decided to gather a little more publicity by the simple matter of the announcement of an engagement? This was just a brilliantly executed PR exercise, for God's sake. And considering how conveniently close the announcement was to the release of their movie together, Guru, can anyone find fault with their stunningly effective move? It's not for nothing that Mr. Amitabh Bachchan's family has been accorded the prestigious title of 'Bollywood's First Family'. These guys know how to keep the media, and the public too, for good measure, passionately interested in anything and everything that they do. It's one of the advantages of having been blessed with superstardom two decades ago - fame can teach you how to handle an entire country. And predictably, the media lapped it all up; just days after the incident of the Bachchans walking a considerable distance to a temple, barefoot, made front-page news, came the report of the momentous engagement, which was given as much reverence as the testing of a nuclear weapon. The beautiful Ms Rai played her part quite effectively too; subtlety has taken a long time in becoming a part of her many charms, but it finally has, and the talented former Miss World ensured that the delay would not go in vain. The effect was deadly - with Ash doggedly dodging the media, Abhishek valiantly going about promoting Guru, and none other than Amitabh Bachchan himself making the formal announcement, the family had it all covered. Brilliant strategy, if you ask me. And guess what, Guru has taken a very good initial too. Stroke of genius!

The saddest thing about this whole affair is the fact that the media is making Indian sensibilities go the Hollywood way. A few years ago not many would have cared how many cans of Pepsi Shahrukh Khan drinks in a day or what Hrithik Roshan's kid's first words were. Now, however, people have actually begun to take interest in such sordid things. And I blame the media squarely for this monstrous turn of events. Particuarly the news channels, who sometimes take such concerted efforts to champion such hopeless non-issues that you actually fear for their sanity. Remember the infamous Shahid-Kareena Kapoor kissing incident?

In defence of the Indian media, they''re only taking a few cues from their counterparts from the West. There, the celebrities and the media have together done such a terrific job of whipping up interest among the common public in even the most awfully insignificant things that it is truly remarkable. The TomCruise-Katie Holmes courtship/wedding made a lot of money for a lot of people, and you've only got to thank the American public's excited interest in the personal lives of their celebrities for that. In fact, so much curiosity and brouhaha was created out of the relationship that even I was induced to watch a couple of movies of the previously unknown Katie Holmes, both of which were eminently rubbish (Distrubing Behavior and Teaching Mrs. Tingle, just in case you need to be warned). The 'Brangelina' episode still dominates headlines, and so do Britney Spears'/Paris Hilton's/Lindsay Lohan's daring escapades, Mel Gibson's occasional lapses into raving insanity, Scarlett Johannson's eternal desire to appear on screen unclothed and Ashton Kutcher's many unfortunate travails that have come from marying an older woman. But I didn't think it possible that our Bollywood stars could even come close to becoming as eccentric and greedy for publicity as their Hollywood counterparts. Sadly, however, they are well and truly on their way to doing so, aided and abetted by the headline-happy media. And to my great discomfort, neither the stars nor the media have been deterred by the initial lack of excitement among the Indian public - they've got a mission to accomplish, and from the looks of things, they're eventually going to accomplish it resoundingly. We humans only need a reason and an occasion to go prying into the lives of others. And when the media willingly provides so many reasons and occasions, and the 'others' lead such magnificently glamorous lives, can we possibly resist the temptation? Tragically, no.

So is there any solution to the madness that will soon engulf us all? Probably not. No wait, I've got an idea - why don't we just shoot all celebrities? Hmm, that'll probably not be too humane. And it might just make our lives a little boring. Hey, I've got another one - let's shoot all the tabloid journalists! No, that wouldn't work either, because we'd never get hold of ALL of them. Alright, before I get any more macabre, I'll stop here. And I hope Ash ditches Abhishek just as cruelly as she did Vivek Oberoi. He hardly deserves someone as beautiful as her.

English Sports Media - How Amusing Thy Wrath!

I wouldn't want to be in the shoes of Ashley Giles right now. Just about everything that can go wrong with anyone seems to be going wrong for him. Personally, I've always thought that he's rather a rubbish bowler, and have always assumed that the English selectors' continued fondness for him was a situation that arose only out of necessity (I'm not very good with cricket stats, but exactly how many quality slow bowlers have England produced over the years? Thank God for Jim Laker-that question would have had precious few answers if not for him). Now, however, it seems plain that the only reason why he has been in the team for so long is that the English selectors have sawdust in their heads. They're barmy-it's as plain as that. If you're starting to think that I'm being a little excessive here, I'm sure you wouldn't even dream of thinking so if you heard what the English media had to say about the second Ashes Test, which, for the uninformed (I seem to use this phrase far too often, don't I?), ended in utter devastation for England.

I don't know when exactly people really started to rub their eyes in disbelief at the possibility of England losing the match, me being a very late sleeper (the match begins at 6 a.m., you know), but I suppose Kevin Pietersen's dismissal might have been the trigger. As England tumbled from one miserable moment to another, the wonderful media persons began unleashing their fury, and believe me, they're right effective when they get down to doing that. Giles, in particular, had the misfortune of being unanimously chosen as the whipping boy. After Geraint Jones and Giles were dismissed, one commentator spoke up, "Remind me please, what exactly are Jones and Giles in the team for?" Andrew Flintoff was repeatedly described as "being close to tears", and some commentators even confessed to being in tears themselves at the appalling show put up by their country's heroes. Giles's dropped catch of Ricky Ponting in the first innings, who went on to make a gritty 142, was brought into the spotlight again, and Steve Waugh's famous line to Herschelle Gibbs when he dropped Waugh in the 1999 World Cup semi-final was tweaked to read something like "Giles has dropped the Ashes". England's unbearably sluggish pace didn't find too many fans either, and Paul Collingwood, who I personally thought did his very best to lend some respectability to England's total, was handed plenty of razor-sharp comments for his slow batting. When the unfortunate Giles came on to bowl, one commentator piped up, "It is my duty, ladies and gentlemen, to tell you that Ashley Giles is not turning the ball." Another commentator came up with perhaps the most priceless of them all-"the statisticians tell me that Ashley Giles has improved his batting average in this match." Was this the most utterly savage piece of sarcasm ever heard? Ah well, this was just a wretched phase for the admirable Giles.

Former England players joined in the slaughter the next day, with Duncan Fletcher's selection methods coming in for the most scathing criticism. Ian Botham confessed to being very confused about Monty Panesar's situation, and I suppose he could be speaking for every single person on earth apart from Mr. Fletcher in saying that. Fletcher's remark earlier in the year which said something to the effect that Panesar was "the best finger spinner in the world" has only made the current situation all the more bewildering. However, England's selection tangles did not arouse the most spirited reactions as Australia romped home to a comfortable six-wicket victory. No - right then, the thing that distressed all Englishmen most was the horrific performance of Flintoff's team. And the commentators certainly employed very effective words to show their anguish-from mourning England's complete lack of fight to declaring that they would never watch cricket again. Amusing, amusing.