Wick 149ao. Lee an excellent 55. Tong a vital 29.GC 150-7. We've all been through it. Games where an umpire - probably a drafted in teacher, parent or, in Fullers Div 2, incompetent opposition player, turns a game of cricket into a circus. The sport doesn't even have to be cricket. A bad football ref is just as irritating. The game is ruined and one side is left feeling bitter and raging against the dying of the light (actually that's a metaphor about death, not sport - but some days they can feel almost as important as each other). This week, two days on from Saturday, I am 100% unrepentant in making poor umpiring the central plank in my match report. It may be one of the last bastions of match reporting that you don’t blame umpiring for your defeat because bad decisions go both ways, often umpires are doing it largely for love of the game etc, but I can't leave umpiring out this week. Occasionally even one decision can be so shocking that it bears description in a report because it leaves a stain on a game. However in this case there were seven decisions that were so bad I can't put them out of my mind. It was almost unbelievable that two should occur in one game never mind the whole series and their effect was to ruin the day and ruin the game. If we had profited in this way ever I would be as disturbed in victory today as I am in defeat this morning. This season we have been lucky at times. We have had the odd important decision go our way - remember Caterham. We’ve won a few crucial tosses - Kempton 2 weeks ago an example.
We’ve also been unlucky at times - Addiscombe (not 'very' unlucky in this case). We’ve lost a few crucial tosses - Battersea an example. I can accept defeat. The game against Addiscombe was a classic, and whilst the decisions were perhaps marginally in Addiscombe's favour (see match report), Addiscombe deserved a victory as much as we did - so there were no complaints from us. We lost, but we had a great day. As Danny Lee regularly says 'I felt alive out there'. We are fair cricketers, which is why we stayed at Addiscombe for two hours after the game, savouring what was an excellent day and hopefully contributing to a great atmosphere too. Last week we were annoyed that we had come off against Kempton. We'd battled ourselves into a winning position, but we were an hour away from 20 crucial points. Hell, we were an over away from 3 vital extra points if we’d been able to stay out and get ahead of the run rate. But, with hindsight, the umpires were correct to take us off the field. What is absolutely impossible to count as luck, good or bad, is incompetent umpiring that borders on the completely unacceptable. For me at least this game was totally undermined and rendered useless by opposition umpiring of a standard that I haven’t even seen in games where opposition players are umpiring, never mind an “official”. Really this umpire should be ashamed of his performance. It was so bad as to be almost impossible to describe. The way I try to rationalize games is to work out who got the decisions (especially the bad ones) because both teams inevitably feel that they've been hard done by. It’s part of the game of cricket at every level I reckon. But check the scores on this one. Wick batting 1, Hibby given out lbw. We all know Hibby plays across the line. However, he invariably walks down the track, outside off stump and sweeps. Think Mal Loye, but at 5ft. The points is, when you are 4ft down the track, and palpably or even probably outside off stump, and the ball hits you on the pad, the decision is 'not out'. You just can’t give them there. Perhaps it’s the old “I was given out for the shot” technique of umpiring? 2, Mackie out. The mode of dismissal tbc. This one was unbelievable. The ball was a beaut, and leapt off just short of a length - Mackie dropping his hands last minute. A stifled appeal from the excellent if vociferous keeper who takes the ball. Umpire puts his finger up. Mackie trudges off assuming he’s been bowled. 'How was that out umpire?' he enquires. 'Bowled' is the response. 'Bowled? But it didn’t hit the stumps'. 'He gloved it', chips in the keeper/fielder. 'Yes, he gloved it, caught.' replies the umpire. Now you tell me how an umpire can legitimately give a batsman out caught if he thinks he has given it out bowled? You don’t give someone out bowled anyway. Dan, the non-striker informs me that he most certainly didn’t glove it. Unsurprisingly, Mackie throws his bat off the field in disgust - legitimately. So what does this say about the standard of the umpiring? At the very least this puts doubt in the mind of the side on the receiving end. If he’s so under confident about why a player is out that he needs to the help of the fielders to give it out there has to be something wrong. GC batting The first innings had been characterised by two distinct spells. Early doors when the new ball made things happen. Later doors when everything seemed to settle and it was easier to bat on. ALL the following lbw calls happened with Fordy at his most potent, early on, with the new ball. Had he given these, or at least some of these, there would have been new batsmen in having to face him at the critical time when the ball was on top. We would have won – I would say easily – as Guildford were all at sea. 1, lbw not given #1. RHB opener. Fordy was bowling beautifully, swinging the ball back in, pitching it in line with middle, stitching him up like a kipper time and time again. 2, lbw not given #2. RHB opener. Please see previous point. 3, lbw not given #3. deja vu 4, lbw not given #4. No comment Please bear in mind that these were not the only appeals. These are just the four which we felt (slips, bowler, keeper) were absolutely dead in front with all the relevant boxes ticked. Perhaps there others where there were elements of doubt. These were plumb. Nailed on certs. Frankly the opener did well to get his pad in the way. He seemed to know early on that he wasn’t going to be given out lbw so he figured he may as well. 5, lbw not given #5. Kam the bowler this time. 6, lbw given. Their #5 was triggered by said umpire - clearly feeling guilty after keeping the more talented opener in all day. He was well forward to a swinging ball (unlike the opener who was nailed on the crease time and again). In its way this decision was every bit as bad as the not outs but by now we were clutching at straws. 7, #8 batsman, who batted pretty sensibly to be fair, decided to lift his foot whilst facing Tongy. Boney snaffled it, whipped the bails off. Now this wasn’t a difficult decision. Everyone could see - Boney behind the sticks, Hibby at sq leg, me at gully, Dan Lee at point - that his foot was raised. It wasn’t just slightly lifted temporarily - something that would require a TV reply to support any call made. His back foot was maybe 6 inches off the ground (his front foot not in the picture), and it didn’t even come down slowly. He was so out as to be embarrassing. The decision was not out. Even I lost it at this point, and I’m the calmest man ever on a cricket field - save David Gower himself. Even if there was one other decision in our innings that went our way – and let’s say there was one, just to make a point that we might have profited somewhere else – I still make that a score of 8-2 in awful decisions against us. That means that we took 15 wickets on Saturday, but were given 7. As I said, you can accept errors. Even the odd glaring error, but it is impossible to accept this. Sadly there is even a precedent for poor umpiring at GC. Playing against GC two years ago (in a game when we were completely outplayed by GC, were managing to hang on for a draw, were roundly thrashed in all but the points allocated at the end, there was a crummy decision which made us fume) Zammy made one pop, the bat was caught at gully, off the glove. The decision was not out. None of us can provide an explanation for this more than two years later. There’s not really much we can do about this now apart from sending a letter of complaint to the league to attempt to have this umpire sent to be properly trained. Nothing will change as a result with respect to this year’s result which is as it should be. But let’s hope that they listen to protect other teams on other days from incompetence of this level. Rant over. GC bowled very well early in our innings. They were very tight early on, and put us five down with only 50 on the board. A few poorly selected shots were mixed in with some good deliveries. Dan Lee with firstly Mackie (see above!) and then Graham pulled the score towards the 150 mark, a score which whilst below par proved to be enough to win the game. We had the momentum into their innings. After a slightly sloppy start, both Fordy and Julian found their range and started the rot. Tong, below par with the ball, and Kam also joined in. With an ageing ball and a flattening wicket, their long-haired #7 decided to wallop it around for fun. It proved to be enough as GC came home fairly comfortably in the end. GC scored at a better rate than we did, so deserve credit for playing the more attacking cricket throughout. However, this game was a farce. This is now parked. Any sense of grievance will be dealt with by a complaint and it will galvanise the team to win the final two games and ensure the push for promotion is continued. That is all we can do, and all we will do.
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