Adil Najam
Seems like everyone who should have been a role model is becoming a symbol of shame.
The most prominent “aalim” in the country is spreading jahalat. The President of the Republic is shouting obscenities. And our endeared sportsman is biting cricket balls to cheat his way to victory (which still alludes him). And all of this is just what we have been talking about the last three days!
Yes, that is exactly what he did. With Pakistan on a losing streak, having lost the first four one-day games and well on its way to losing the fifth, Shahid Afridi took the cricket ball and actually started biting it, even as the television camera was squarely focused on him doing so. And why would Shahid Afridi indulge in this illegal, and rather disgusting, form of ball tampering?
Here is his response, in his own words:
I shouldn’t have done it. It just happened. I was trying to help my bowlers and win a match, one match… There is no team in the world that doesn’t tamper with the ball. My methods were wrong. I am embarrassed, I shouldn’t have done it. I just wanted to win us a game but this was the wrong way to do it.
Is it just me or is he actually missing the point?
Read the statement again: “There is no team in the world that doesn’t tamper with the ball. My methods were wrong.”
What is he saying? That tampering is OK but his “methods” were wrong? Pray tell us, Sir, what would be the “right” method for tampering a cricket ball!
That Shahid Afridi, a cricketer so loved by the nation including at this blog, should do this makes the pain even more hurtful. Shahid Afridi has been slapped with a punishment of having to miss two 20-20 games. But, as blogger Teeth Maestro (where I first saw this video) argues, that is not enough and the Pakistan Cricket Board should itself look into the matter and provide sterner punishment.
Politics, media, and now sports. Let us please have some repercussions to bad behavior, somewhere!
@ Banawa
There is no need to give the benefit of doubt to Afridi. He has said that he is ’embarassed’ by what he has done and should not have done so.
he admits to ball tampering. Where is the doubt?
Just thought I would defend the WSJ a bit:
They have looked at the IPL situation in a sympathetic light here:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240527487043 75604575023913095904150.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTT opBucket
and here
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240527487044 23204575016942685730532.html?mod=WSJ_hp_editorsPic ks
Benawa and Eidee Man : I am sure you have felt angry at posters saying things which were unratified or untrue : well you just joined the club : so please be sympathetic to them from now on :).
I dont think Pakistan as a whole needs to be ashamed of what Afridi did : The subcontinent needs to take cricket a lot less seriously – Imagine Billions of people getting into all this fuss simply because of the behavior of 11 essentially low IQ jocks!
I agree with the point about WSJ; I’m always a bit surprised to see Pakistani cricket controversies being highlighted there. Although sometimes they simply re-publish wire pieces from AP, etc, and somehow news aggregators like Google pick them up over others.
Shahid Afridi may need a tetanus shot, if he incurred a wound
from biting and licking the dogs droppings off the ball.
Hey I have taken my dog to the stadium and I cant pick every bit of it . LOL!
Gee I wonder why Wall Street Journal has suddenly developed
an interest in cricket? Where was WSJ during Afridi’s heroics in
in England in the summer of 09? Where was WSJ during
the recent IPL spat in India where WSJ’s dear friends, the Indians, sought to keep some of world’s the best players out
of their country, in a most cowardly and shameful
manner?
BTW, as a general rule, I take everything related to
Pakistan that is ever printed in WSJ with a grain of salt, and
I advise everybody else to do the same.
Before jumping to conclusion, I’d like to hear what Afridi
has to say for himself. I am willing to give him the benefit
of my doubt…