The Oval Goes Pear-Shaped*

The heat has been on me for a few weeks as it turns out the police still want me for murder. However, all is calm at the moment and I want to talk cricket. The cricketing world is in chaos after events at The Oval yesterday afternoon. The finger of blame doesn't know where to point or whether ball tampering had really taken place. So to simplify it here are the candidates for who is to blame:

1. Darrell Hair. The umpire and also none too keen on those funny Islam Pakistani Chappies. While the rest of the world can't find any evidence of ball tampering Hair could. Furthermore once Pakistan did decide to come out and both teams were ready and wanted to play he knocked the bails of the stumps and could be seen to have ruined the game for everyone.

2. Inzamam-Ul-Haq (aka Inzy). The fat bloke with a beard, Pakistani captain and also none to keen on that Ozzy bastard Hair. His stubborness which resulted in Pakistan not coming out after tea triggered the farce. Mummy Lucan had always taught me how to be a good sport and that if things go against you to take it on the chin and play up, play up and play the game. Could his childish strop runied the game by forcing the umpires to remove the bails?

3. Mike Procter. It is strange that at the end of test match and the match referee is presented with an N-Power medallion that nobody knows what the hell the match referee has done for the past five days. Well this test match did require the services of the match referee. However, his diplomatic skills failed to get Hair and Doctrove (the other umpire) to come out once the Pakistani team had come out.

4. ICC. Cricket's governing body who are based in Dubai. Funnily enough today is a national holiday in Dubai and there were only plans to have a skeleton staff. As a result, today they can't tell their arse from their elbow. However, should they have made Hair one of the series umpires despite his reputation of not getting on too well with Pakistan? If Billy Bowden had got the gig would this have happened? I doubt it and the the series would have been more amusing with his unconventional signals.

5. Sky Sports. I'm not to sure how Rupert Murdoch's Sky Sports is to blame. However, if the television rights had stayed with Channel 4 and the calming tones of Richie Beanaud this would never have happened.

The whole situation is very confusing, however, I hope the Lord Lucan guide to what the hell happened at the Oval has helped. All I say is roll on the one day series, it should be a cracker.

*Genius headline if I say so myself