THE 14-RUN OVER

The 2013 edition of the Indian Premiere League was a whole lot different from all of its previous editions. Controversy was a tag the cash-rich league had been carrying with it, ever since its inception, and the sixth edition, in a way, managed to get rid of just that. We were well into the business end of the tournament and in a welcoming change, the tournament had been clean upto that point. No sexual abuse, no drunken violence, and the matches got more of the focus than the parties. For the first time, people were talking about cricket whenever the league was mentioned.  The focus was on the performances, and rightly so. The sixth edition of the IPL is considered to be one of the toughest, simply due to the number of teams vying for a final four berth. The previous editions had atleast 2-3 of the final four decided well before the closing matches of the league stage. This time around, however, the top four had to wait until the final game of the round-robin stage, to be decided. And so, all was well. Or so were we led to believe.

Enter a certain trio from Rajasthan. While one among them, believed to be the main culprit in the whole scam, had a reputation not many would approve of, the other two seemed to be the future, showing a ton of promise, especially the lanky off-spinner. And what do you know? For all the praise that was heaped on them, they repaid with a slap in the face, insulting the intelligence and emotion of every single person who had been sincerely following the action for the past 6 weeks, under the assumption that they were watching a bunch of players, sincerely committed to bringing out their best and giving their blood, sweat and tears, in order to be the best that ever competed. Definitely, they were oblivious to the fact that what they were watching on screen was merely a form of flattery, carried out masterfully by men, who had no sense of remorse or guilt for their deceitful actions. The three represented everything that is against humanity and sportsmanship.

The one question amidst all of this that has been bothering me for quite some time now however, is what the three of them did to make those easy bucks. If media reports are to be believed, signals were sent out to the bookies, who were present at the venue, through such acts as tucking a towel outside, as in one case, when a certain bowler is believed to have given 14 runs in an over, as per the deal. Now this is where I have to stop you to say that this matter is worth much deeper analysis. Yes, such incidents have occurred in the past. Cricket is no stranger to the shameful act of spot-fixing, or for that matter, even match-fixing. But, 14 runs in an over, atleast to me, seems to be something that is extremely difficult to pull off.

Now before I proceed any further on this matter, let me make it very clear that I am, by no means, defending the tainted trio. I’m merely looking at the feasibility and the chances of such an act to be pulled off successfully. A few years back, another tainted trio from Pakistan, was caught in a similar act, and were duly dealt with. But, that was a different matter. They bowled no-balls in order to make money. Deliberately stepping over the line is undoubtedly very possible. But, to make a promise of giving a certain number of runs in an over and pulling it off doesn’t seem so possible. Don’t believe me? Alright, try it out for yourselves. Take a friend along, and ask him to deliberately bowl a bad ball, so you can hit a six off it. Just see if you’re able to pull it off, and if you do, repeat the same act. I’d be surprised if you manage to find 30, or at the most, 50% success. I’m sure its not going to work out 10 out of 10 times. No matter how deliberately and how badly he bowls, it is not going to be possible to fetch the desired result at every attempt. So, if you’re not going to find success, doing it repeatedly with a friend, with both parties aware of what’s going on, how on earth are you going to find success in an international match where its just one ball that you’re supposed to bowl badly and the opponent is not even aware that the ball is supposed to clear the boundary? You may bowl as badly as you want, but for all you know, the opposition batsman might be in the worst form of his life and may not even make connection with the ball. Now you may argue that a bowler can easily bowl down the leg side and bowl it so wide, that it goes for a boundary as well. But, mind you, the trio’s case was altogether different. The rest of the team was kept in bliss of the whole thing. Only the three of them knew what they were up to, which means no matter how wide they delivered the ball, the keeper was always going to give it his best shot and try and prevent the ball from going down to the boundary. Agreed, there’s a good chance he might fail in his attempt, but again, there’s no guarantee its going to happen. So, then, where is the question of agreeing to leak a certain number of runs as part of the deal?

Cricket, mind you, is not a contact sport. Its tough to fix matches, or rather spots, and pull them off successfully. Pre-determined results can happen in contact sports, such as wrestling, or boxing. If I were to agree to lose in a wrestling match to someone, in a bid to make extra bucks, I could easily do so, without creating a shadow of a doubt in anybody’s mind. I could deliberately allow my opponent to attack me and get the upper hand, while coming up with an occasional counter or two, and make it all seem real. Its because I can choose what to do with my hands. I can throw them at my opponent, or keep them to myself, and the target is standing right in front of me. Cricket is a different game, however. The opponent is not standing right in front of you. There’s a distance of 22 unpredictable yards that separate you from your opponent and anything can happen within that space. The only real possible way of fixing a spot, is to bowl a no-ball. That is perhaps, the safest, and the single most effective way to guarantee that a particular event will happen beforehand. Yes, the trio from Rajasthan might be guilty. And if proven, they must be banned for life from representing any team, at all levels of the game, for the disrepute they have brought to the “Gentleman’s Game” this great sport has carried over the years. But, to say that they gave 14 runs in an over, requires a question or two to be asked, and is certainly worthy of far deeper analysis.