Ugly 'tamasha' in Australia

Malcolm Marshall took 376 test wickets and 157 in one-day internationals. These statistics by themselves make him a great fast bowler. But they tell nothing of the terror he struck in the minds of batsmen. He was by no means the fastest bowler ever produced in cricket, not even the fastest produced by the West Indies. But I have heard Pakistan batsmen say that they would have rather faced Lillie and Thompson than Marshall. He was not a man mountain of a man.

In fact he did not look like the stereotype of a fast bowler, the way Wesley Hall did. But he was deceptively quick with his whippy action and he was always coming at the batsmen in the area of the ribcage. Starting with Learie Constantine and Martindale down to Curtly Ambrose and Walsh, there have been great fast bowlers, Hall, Griffith, Roberts, Holding, Garner, Colin Croft, to be considered probably the best among them is high praise indeed. He arrived on the cricket scene in the 1970's but was in the 1980's that he became, by common consent, the scourge of the world's batsmen, an unlikely assassin. From the tributes paid to him, it is apparent that he played his cricket hard as he was expected to when the West Indies were all-conquering. What were the prospects of the opposition? They had to bowl to Haynes, Greenidge, Richards and Clive Lloyd and the batsmen had to face Roberts, Holding and when they had done so, on came Malcolm Marshall. It was a no-win situation.

Malcolm Marshall died at the age of 41 losing his battle with colon cancer. He had fallen ill during the World Cup earlier this year when he was the coach of the West Indies team. No one at the time imagined that this illness would by the one batsman he would not get out. The entire cricket world mourns his death. Off the field, he was one of the nicest persons. I cannot claim to have known him well. But whenever we met we exchanged greetings and there would be a warm smile. Cricketers are now being produced as if they are coming of an assembly line. Only a handful can be considered to be characters who will leave an indelible mark on the game and be remembered for being individuals rather than a face in the crowd. Malcolm Marshall will be remembered as someone who was good for the game, a terrific competitor and a decent person rolled into one. Our hearts go out to his young wife Connie and his son.

The attempt to create some sort of a tamasha around Shoaib Akhtar's bowling action has fizzled out. This is because the Australians were badly bitten by the Muralitharan affair and knew that any attempt to re-create a similar kind of controversy would boomerang badly. I recall a conversation I had with a senior and highly respected official of the Sri Lankan cricket team in Dhaka during the final of the Asian test championship. He told me that the Australians may make "trouble" about Shoaib Akhtar's bowling action. I was a little surprised and asked him whether he himself had any doubts. "Absolutely none," he had said, "but the Australians wage a psychological war before a series begins." Shoaib Akhtar had no problems at all during the World Cup and the world's best umpires were officiating in that tournament. So what exactly were umpires Emerson and Prue trying to prove by sending a video-footage of Shoaib Akhtar's bowling action to the ABC? Were they acting on their own or were they a part of a bigger plan to upset the young Pakistani fast bowler? We don't know and it does not seem to matter. The Pakistan team management handled it well and showed firmness and Shoaib Akhtar too seems unaffected. But why should needless controversies be injected that only create bad blood? What makes it worse is that the whole thing is carried out in the full glare of publicity. It was bad enough the way the case of Shabbir was handled. Muralitharan has taken a long time to have his bowling action accepted. Will Shabbir too have to go through the same ordeal?

I am a little baffled as to why Saqlain Mushtaq is not playing. He has not played in a single match in Australia so far including the Brisbane Test match. There was some mention by the commentators of a knee injury. The question arises: did he bring the injury with him? If he did then it is a serious matter for he should not have been selected in the first place. A lot of fuss was made about Shoaib Akhtar having to undergo a fitness test before he was selected to go to Australia. Why wasn't Saqlain Mushtaq subjected to a similar fitness test? There is no doubt in anyone's mind that he is a key member of the team. But what good is he is not playing? As it is, Pakistan took two opening batsmen with them, Wasti and Ghulam Ali, neither of whom played in the Brisbane test match and young Mohammad Wasim has to open the innings. Mohammad Wasim is not an opening batsman and I think that is unfair to him to be made a sacrificial lamb. He has come back into the Pakistan team after being mysteriously sidelined. We should be nursing him for he has the same kind of potential as Yusuf Youhana. We must not be seen to be sacrificing the future for short term benefits of the present. The selectors should have known the limitations of Wasti and Ghulam Ali. Aamir Sohail would have been the right choice. He could have bowled a few overs as well instead of Ijaz having to do so