Australia – a lovely place to play test cricket..

Never had I felt this confident. I hope this time the dream will turn into reality. I have been waiting for this for so long. The Boxing Day is less than 10 hours away.

Come December 26^th, as India is getting ready to take the field against Australia in the first test of the coveted “Border-Gavaskar trophy” in Melbourne, the hope of India’s first ever test series victory down under looms large in my mind. Also, a loss for Australia in the second test against a depleted Kiwis’ side in Hobart augurs well in India’s favour. But, can hopes be rested on India for completing this unaccomplished mission of a test series victory in Australia?

Though this question will be answered in a few weeks’s time, let me brief you  all as to why India vs Australia series has become a telling factor in world cricket nowadays though we were used to see India’s batting talent  going into a state of desuetude in Australian pitches, more often than not.

We have seen our openers tremble on seeing the Aussie pacemen bowling at the top of their form in the pitches which were offering true pace and bounce. We had seen them initimidating us by playing the mind games on us well ahead of every tour warning us of the so called “Chin Music”. We had seen Ajit Agarkar infamously getting renamed as “Bombay Duck” as he got out four times in the first ball of his innings and ofcourse somehow managed crediting himself with some dignity as he got out on another duck but this time only in the second ball of his innings.

The series between Australia and India had always been controversial as we saw Sachin getting out “Face Before Wicket” of the bowling of Glenn Mcgrath. We have seen the “Monkey Gate” scandal involving Harbhajan and Andrew Symonds. We had seen everything.

Australia is the lovely place to see cricket for the viewers like us and it is the best place to play cricket for the cricketers. The commentary of Richie Benaud welcomes us on Channel 9 channel as we get up early morning in India to watch cricket. The entertaining commentary of Bill Lawry terming any incredible shots, played by a batsman as “Ripper” in his own rhthymic style and his love for pigeons are something which come to my mind when I think of cricket in Australia. The unbiased and biased commentaries of Tony Greig and Ian Chappel respectively add charm to the game.

Australia has the most beautiful ground in the world in Adelaide, the fastest pitch in the world in Perth and the largest boundary in the world in Melbourne.

So far, we, Indians, were able to enjoy these things alone and now for the first time I feel we will be able to enjoy India winning test series also in addition to all these.

Finally, on cricketing perspective, to have my hopes come true, I only hope that the format of four slips and a gully does not play in the minds of our distinguished batsmen.

An unrealised truth in Ramayan

I happened to see a tweet today, describing Lord Rama as a bad husband, a remark which came in the wake of the recently released film called “Sri Rama Rajyam”. The person who so tweeted, obviously, did not like Rama disowning his pregnant wife Sita from the kingdom of Ayodhya and I know many of the people who have read this part of the story would have developed the same sort of view on the lord.

I am writing this article specifically to eradicate this type of negative thought on “Rama”. Any one who has read “Valmiki Ramayana” in full would really think twice before giving such a shameful verdict on Rama. First of all, everyone should know that Rama loved Sita to the core and he loved her more than anyone else. I can show an example to accentuate my point.

When Rama, along with Lakshmana and Sita, was proceeding to a dense forest called “Dandaka Vana” a hugely gigantic demon by name Viraada abducted Sita in the former’s presence. So far then, Lord Rama, whenever anyone spoke ill of Kaikeyi for her hand in the exile of Rama for fourteen long years, he came to her rescue by instructing others not to speak anything wrong about her as he treated her to be his own mother.  But, this time when Viraada fled with Sita, he got so angry and frustrated in seeing his beloved wife in the hands of a demon that he, for the first time, rebuked Kaikeyi in her absence by citing her to be the reason for such a precarious situation which Sita was experiencing. This itself proved how much Rama was affectionate towards Sita.

Any way, now coming to the banishment of Sita from Ayodhya, we should think as to why Sita, who was so dear to Rama, should be sent out of the kingdom? My answer is Rama did it not because he did not trust Sita but because he did not trust the people of the world who could speak in any tone about anybody, be the topic of the subject was a “Pathivratha” like Sita. True, Sita had proved her purity to the whole world by prevailing in the “Agni Pariksha” immediately at the end of the war where Ravana was killed. But the spectators of that incident were just “Vanaras” from Kishkinta and ofcourse the demon king “Vibishana”. The people of Ayodhya did not witness it. So, how would one expect them to believe how chaste Sita was?

Infact this was the reason a few section of people doubted “Mata Sita” and for that very purpose Rama asked Sita to be sent out of the kingdom. Those who superficially look into this incident, as many people today are doing, will not understand as to why it was done. Imagine what would have happened if Rama did not do it and kept Sita with him till he left for “Vaikunta”. The people of Ayodhya would have continued assassinating the character of Sita and if that had happened then the whole of them would have become sinners only to suffer severly in hell for their wrong doing.

Rama, being the king of Ayodhya,  thought it was he who should save his own subjects from enduring such a punishment. So, what did Rama do? He thought of putting the blame on himself by disowning his dear wife. Only because he did this, people of Ayodhya were able to witness how immaculate Sita was when earth split into two, therby swallowing her only to prevent the holy feet of her to touch the sinful earth anymore. Afterwards, the same people, who had a thing or two to say about her, now realized how bad they were in misjudging her and thus they were freed from their sins.

That is the beauty of the kind hearted Rama who wanted his subjects not to commit sins at the expense of his spending time with Sita all through out his life. Rama, thus, decided to take it upon himself the burden of getting injured by the volley of verbal arrows showered by ignorant people like us who feel Rama as a bad husband and all.

People may ask in such a case “Okay, we don’t doubt Sita anymore because of this act of Rama but we are any way targeting Rama blaming him for this act. Is it right?” If this was the question then I would say “Yes it is not right but it is better that we say ill about Rama rather than saying something extremely bad about Sita”. That is the beauty of our Indian society and culture which rate the chastity of our women above all else.

So, considering all these things we should thank Rama, on whose selfless act, we keep “Mata Sita” in high regard even today.  It is true that Sita requires no more recognition for her purity but considering the people in this world who are “gossip prone” what Rama did was absolutely correct.                             

More importantly, Rama gave respect to his subjects more than his own family unlike some of our politicians who treat family more than public, come what may.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

A man who died 88 years young

A couple of months before, he celebrated his 88^th birthday. Now it is obvious he is not going to add on to that anymore.   One of the passionate stars of Indian Film industry, Mr.Dev Anand, as we all know him, is now no more. The fact that he established his own production called “Nav Ketan” more than five decades ago when he was just in the middle of his twenties showed his love for the tinsel world.

As an actor he had starred in over 100 films and also did taste a few successes as a director.  When one looks into the overall career of the actor, he had more failures to start with before hogging the limelight. Infact, he always had to be under the shadows of actress “Soraiya” with whom he had paired in the beginning of his film career as the latter was an established actor already.

To add to his ordinary start in films as an actor, always playing a second fiddle to his heroine “Soraiya”, his real life also took a beating as far as his romance was concerned since he had to drop the plan of marrying his on screen heroine, no one else but “Soraiya”again. Anyway, this had not dissuaded his persuasion on establishing a name for himself in film industry.

Like a song in one of his films, “Hum Dono”, where Rafi voiced him with the wonderful lyrics which read “Mein Zindagi ka Saath nibatha Chala gaya” his life went on. His awesome rapid fire dialogue deliveries slowly started to impress the film audience and in the process he gradually entered the stardom which he was hoping for at the start of his career. His unique walking style and his looks added aroma to his acting abilities and soon he came into reckoning with his compatriots on those days, viz., Raj Kapoor and Dilip Kumar.

When he brought R.K.Narayan’s guide on to screen, it doubled the popularity of Dev and even now some people remembers Dev especially for his performance in that film. The songs were extremely melodious and many people even now whisper the song “Gaata Rahe mera dil” which was one of  the highlights of that film. Another notable film of his was “Jewel Thief” which was a three hour thriller movie which would bind the audience from the start till the end.

Most of the songs in his films were either sung by Mohd.Rafi or Kishore Kumar and all of them had been extremely lovable, to say the least. Infact, Kishore Kumar first gave play back to Dev Anand only and till then he used to sing only for himself. He had been a no nonsense actor throughout his career and so he had some good friendships with fellow film artists, notable among them were late Kishore Kumar and more importantly late Guru Dutt.

He considered himself young and had paired with co-stars who were not even half his age including Tina Munim. He brought in beautiful Zeenat Aman in the screen as well.  He had been always workaholic and had directed many films recently which included his latest release called “Charge Sheet”.  Even at the age of 88,  when directing a film was no joke,  Dev, due to his passion in what he was doing,  always had been in the film industry as a director, producer and also as an actor.

Now that Dev Anand is no more, it is highly improbable to find a person of his charisma and evergreen quality. I don’t think everyone will regard him as one of the best actors in bollywood but for me all I can say is  “I love his acting”.Good bye Dev Anand.

The A game

A man brought his grandson first time to the tennis court and it turned out to be a match between two of the players of which one of those was known across the world in every household. His grandson, seeing the game for the first time ever, with very much curiosity inquired his grandpa thus: “Grandpa, Two players are playing this game here. One is playing left handed and the other is playing right handed. One is using two hands to hit the ball when the ball is landing on to his right side but the other player is hitting the ball with only one hand wherever the ball lands. What sort of game is this grandpa? I can’t understand?”

Grandpa was calmly listening to the boy and before he could answer one more question awaited him. The boy further asked his grandpa “ Grandpa, what are the name of these two players? The left handed player is unable to collect the balls hit by the right hander and on the other hand whichever direction the ball was hit this right handed player is able to collect. How is this grandpa? One person is playing so well and the other, I think is not able to cope up with him. This is the first time I am watching this game but still I seem to like this right handed player’s game so much. Am I right grandpa? In this brief period, I think if I have to learn this game I need to see this right handed player play the game. This is what I think.  I think there will be no other player in this game, I guess, who can match the beauty of the game I am seeing from this right hander. Is it right grandpa?”

Having listened patiently to whatever questions his grandson asked him, the man replied to his grandson with a smile on his face. “My dear grandson, you are right. I am very happy to hear that you want to learn seeing this right hander play. If you do, then you will also become one of the great players on planet earth just like this guy who is about to win this match in a short time now.  My dear son, he is the guy who is referred to as the “GOAT” of the game. I mean he is known and revered by everybody as the “Greatest player of all times”. His name is Roger Federer and he is called also as “Swiss Maestro” as he belongs to the country of Switzerland. The left hander who is playing against him is Rafael Nadal from Spain. The winner of this game is surely to reach the semi fnals of this tournament which is called ÄTP world tour finals. My dear Grandson, you were asking me as to why you feel this right hander is playing so well as compared to this left hander. Well son, it is not his fault. When Roger Federer plays tennis against anybody, no one would like to watch the other guy’s game who is pitted against him. No matter who ever plays against Federer, you will get the feeling that the other guy is not capable of playing this game” This was the reply given by this man to his grandson.

Such is the greatness of Roger Federer who destroyed Rafa by producing the game of tennis which the latter would never forget in his life time. Just like Shane Warne, who after bowling to Sachin Tendulkar, reportedly told the world that he got night mares of Sachin while sleeping, from now on I would be surprised if Rafa does not get any such night mares of Federer. Infact I would say if he gets to see Federer playing the game in his dream it would rather be relished by him, I believe and so cannot be termed as a night mare.

After all, it was the day Nadal saw the “Ä” game of Federer. Federer amassed as much as 28 winners in yesterday’s game and lost only three games overall. What happens when Federer brings his “Ä” game is what the whole world saw in London and for Nadal it was nothing short of a night marish experience. When Federer comes with his full strength and plays all the shots that he possess, this is what happens. Rafa becomes a mute spectator. Rafa does not figure out where the ball is going to land. Rafa cannot come up with any of the shots which will become a winner against the GOAT. Rafa  runs here and there only to find the other person covering the court without running that much. Rafa panics. Rafa hits unforced errors. Rafa hits the balls which lands outside the baseline. Rafa hits the balls straight at the nets. This was the scenario that I witnessed yesterday.

Leave alone Rafa, who only had hit 4 winners yesterday in his match against Federer, this was the situation in which most of the players would have found themselves in if they had to see Roger Federer standing at the other side of the net. So, we can have just a spare of thought for Rafa.

As far as playing this game, Federer is a real wizard. He does things with racquets which no other person would have even dreamt. He creates angles which are simply out of world tennis. You will not be able to guess what he is attempting when you are playing against him for he would switch over immediately from fore hand to back hand and vice versa. Even with those shots, he does unbelievable things. He has more variety in shot making than anyone else. You won’t find him playing from the baseline all the time unlike many of his contemporaries. He will be at the baseline sometime, will proceed to the nets sometime, will stand between the baseline and nets some time and produce some incredible shots which were never viewed in the game by anyone.

The magic, he creates, is simply phenomenal. You will feel as if you cannot create a winner from a certain position but he will come up with a shot which you would not have even imagined. No wonder John Mcenroe once commented form the box “How he is creating such an angle?”  There are many remarkable shots in his repertoire which he produces with astounding ease and to be able to do such a thing from a position where you cannot think so much since tennis is one of the busiest games where you have to keep on running, is something astonishing, to say the least.

Roger has won so far 804 matches with only 186 losses in his entire career so far and only those losses still make us believe that he is human. The sort of game he used to play during his peak period between 2004 and 2007 has started to rise after a little decline for sometime.

The genius of the game is now showing his true potential which means its “game over” for the rest of the players.

I guess this would be the sequel

This is the squillionth time, in all probability, I am watching the Hollywood block-buster called “Speed”. I feel this is one of the most adventurous movies I had ever seen. I always wondered why such type of an action packed film is not being made in India. Ok, let me ponder as to how the film will be if it is ever remade in India.

I guess this would be the sequel. First let us name the character of our hero. I mean the role of the police officer called “Jack”, played by Keanu Reeves. In Indian movies, the character of any hero will be named as “Raj” if it is a hindi film and if at all it is a tamil film I cannot think beyond the name called “Siva”. Since I am an Indian first and then a tamilian, I would like to stick with the former.

Raj has an unfinished business with a villain, better known as Gabbar Singh, who is an expert in planting of novel bombs. Gabbar earlier invested himself for two years in a project of planting bomb in an elevator only to claim a ransom from the government but he was made to bite the dust by Raj who, single handedly, came and rescued all the commuters trapped in it.

Now it is payback time for Gabbar. In one fine morning, Raj hears a huge blast on the road side and finds that an empty bus, just started from the terminus, with only a driver in it, is bombed and reduced to ashes. Immediately, he hears a telephone ringing from a booth nearby and he goes and picks up the call. He hears from Gabbar that he has planted a similar bomb on one of the buses which is 100 Kms away from where Raj is right now. The stipulation is none of the passengers in the bus Is allowed to get out of the bus. The bus has a bomb which gets activated once the bus crosses 80 Kms in speed and if it drops in speed below 80 then the bus will blow off.

Hearing this, Raj’s eyes get reddened and he bites his teeth, the noise emanating from which is found winning with more decibels than the blast which just took place in a bus. Then a song goes on the background for five minutes narrating the incomparable energy of the hero. Once the song is over, he starts to run. He is not using any bike or car. He just runs ten times faster than, say, Ussain Bolt, only to chase the bus and empty it before the bomb gets activated. Infact, he might have done so. But, the villain, anticipating the might of the hero, sends 100 hitmen to have him stopped mid way before he does rescue the passengers in the bus.

All these hitmen carry knifes and hockey sticks with them but Raj has only a small pistol with him. But, he chooses not to use it. Instead he uses his hands and legs as weapons and thrashes them all in just ten minutes time. Then again he goes after the bus. He is running so fast that the same bus which was once 100 Kms away from him is just a stone throw nearer to him now. He assesses the speed of the bus by comparing with the swiftness which he has in his running and finds to his dismay that the bus has already crossed 80 Kms and the bomb is activated. So, now he needs to get into the bus to do something. Guess what, he collides himself into the door of the bus with so much of power that if flows and hits the driver, leaving the latter unconscious.

Raj enters the bus and announces to all that there is a bomb on the bus. Seeing his heroics, a cute girl inside the bus falls in love with the hero. Then our hero forgets everything. Both of them go to an entirely a different world to sing a duet. Once the duet is over, the hero realizes his responsibilities. He becomes the driver himself. As a true hero of any Indian film, he knows swimming, horse riding, knows to drive everything that runs on roads, knows even to drive train. Even he can fly an aeroplane, can anchor a ship and so on he has innumerable capabilities. He keeps the speed over 80 Kms all the time and suddenly he found in another 100 m there is going to be gap of 100 feet long. He is in a catch 22 situation. On one hand, he cannot stop the bus and on the other hand there is a gap which cannot be avoided. 

He switches gears and increases the pace in such a manner that as soon as the bus encounters the gap it flies and flies and flies and it nearly catches a jet plane flying in the sky. Once when the bus lands on the road again the force is so much that the heroine who is seated at the back of the bus inadvertently flows and splashes herself on our hero, who is now the make shift driver. Now, the impact of the clash of the heroine with Raj is so magnetic that both again go in their own dreamland and sing the second duet of the film. This five minutes long song is picturised across the world.

He then, gets permission from Gabbar and goes out of the bus. The bus, however, with the super heroic powers of Raj, continues to run without a driver. Raj is only a cop and he has no knowledge on the diffusing of bombs and all. But, he chooses to take this risk. He comes in a motor bike with an incredible speed in front of the bus and slides himself with the bike and goes under the bus and with the help of his instinct he cuts the correct wires and diffuses the bomb in no time. Then he punches the bottom of the bus with his hand and the bus gets a new opening under it from which the hero enters the bus and says the bomb is diffused and all of the commuters are safe.

Then, every passengers begin to heap praise on him and sing a song on him thanking him for rescuing all of them from by doing blinder of heroics. 

Raj then gets an award from President of India for the bravery that he showed in protecting all the passengers from the near death situation. He marries the girl with whom he has sung two duets in his dream world and there ends the film.

I think this is the best sequel I could think of when we can try copying a Hollywood film. Hope you all have enjoyed it.

Oops, for all those who wants to know what happened to Gabbar. Here it is, he sees all these heroics of Raj on Tv and commits suicide.

Commend them for doing their duty and follow their foot steps:

So what? Dr.A.P.J.Kalam was frisked in America. What is our problem in it? Why media is creating so much hype? For me I don’t even think it is an issue to be discussed. Many of the people of India, on hearing this news, have got excited and have used abusive language against the Americans. But, do you think we should give importance to such things? In fact, we should give importance to such things in a different perspective. In our country also, we need to do the same to the visiting VIPs or VVIPs from various countries. Forgive me, if you felt that my tone had anything to do with vengeance. It is not so.

All I am saying is we have to be as careful as USA  when any one enters our boundary irrespective of not only his caste or creed but also without giving importance to his reputation. It is what I feel USA has learnt. We should have followed the foot-steps of USA much earlier. Though, we had not been very circumspect following Mumbai blasts in 90s, we should have learnt it by taking a leaf out of the book of USA, who turned their country into a perfect “fortress” once they experienced the diabolical terrorist attack, which was later on infamously named as 9/11. 

USA has been very vigilant since then. They have been protecting their country with utmost care and diligence for which we should commend them. Instead of appreciating them for the efforts they had put in we are just giving them a mouthful through various verbal onslaughts. Why should we do it? USA have learnt through hard ways to protect their people and country and which is one thing we have not done yet. If only, we had been cautious in doing so, we might have not lost so many lives the way we did. We are in a situation where we have no idea what would happen next second in our country.

Speaking against the officials of America who are exercising only their duties, we show to the whole world we are not careful about protecting our country. Dr.A.P.J.Abdul Kalam is a known figure in India. We cannot take it as granted that he is known to the entire world. Besides, he was only a former president of India and he is not the first citizen now. So, what is wrong if such people were checked at Airports of different countries? May be they were not aware who he was. Even if they were aware such checking should not be questioned as to why it had happened because they had done it with security of their country in mind.

Neither we rule America nor are we ruled by them. Both these two nations are independent. We, Indians, have no right to question their law of the land. We are incapable of guarding our country against terrorists only because we have been giving a separate treatment to certain people, labeling them as VIPs. In India, every citizen has to be treated as the same and no one should be treated as a blue-collared person. Only because we do it, those royal VIPs or VVIPs are evading punishments. Who is going to stop us if in case we have developed a practice of frisking any body who is a non-Indian, entering our country? It is not a crime in any case. Who has the right to tell us that we should not have done it? Think about it before making this Kalam issue as a major one.

One time, we are saying frisking Abdul Kalam is wrong. Then we are saying frisking Shahrukh Khan is wrong and then we are saying frisking Mamooty is wrong. We are going on saying like this. We knew these people but how could you expect an American to know them. Even assuming that they knew them, it should not be condemned if these people are monitored because we cannot keep on asking them to leave these people stating that they are VIPs. Had Americans been capricious in doing their duties by giving any importance to the reputation of the people then they would have also had the taste of serial bomb blasts much as we had been tasting year after year. 

Americans were able to put a strangle hold on terrorists only because of their sincerity which they exhibit in shielding their nation. We need to take this frisking of Dr.Abdul Kalam positively and we should also try to do the same to any foreigner visiting our country. Frisk Obama, Frisk Hillary or anyone for that matter, having only the welfare of the nation on mind. We can argue that "A Or B” is a very honest person and so should not be frisked. But even in that case, what was the guarantee that his or her belongings were not swapped? I mean what is the guarantee that he or she without his or her knowledge carries any disastrous items which he or she happened to take possession of thinking that it belonged to himself ór herself? Can any one guarantee it? 

So, please do not criticize things which are done for the welfare of a country. For Americans, their country is important. So, we Indians have to decide whether a reputation of a person or our country’s protection is important. If you could answer that, you will not treat this Dr.Kalam’s frisking as an issue at all. I hope we will atleast change from here on and seal our doors permanently for terrorists.

Game spoilers

Mohd Asif and Salman Butt – These two names appeared in the headlines of some of the newspapers in India a couple of days ago. They are supposed to be cricketers and the names of those fellows should appear in any headlines if they succeed in rewriting the Wikipedia containing the records of some of the great legends of the game.

Going back more than a decade before, I saw Mr.Hansie Cronje, the then captain of South Africa, shedding tears in his dressing room, as he watched a disastrous and suicidal run out of Allan Donald and Lance Klusener which ruined his team’s chance of making it to, what would have been their first world cup final.  My eyes also got wet at that particular juncture not only because of seeing my favourite team losing their chances of going to the final but also due to the fact that their revered captain, who I thought was a great patriot then, wept for having missed a flight ticket to Lords in 1999. Hardly, I knew then that he was a crocodile whose eyes were shedding false tears.

A year later, we came to know of one Mukesh Gupta and his proximity to Mr.Hansie Cronje. For those of you who had forgotten this name, I would like to refresh your minds as to who he was. Mr.Mukesh Gupta was a business man who had indulged in illegal betting and match fixing in cahoots with Mr.Hansie Cronje. Later, we came to know Mr.Cronje was a regular doer of this crime in cricket and he had people like Boje and Gibbs assisting him. So, surprising it was and then this once respected captain of South Africa, Mr.Cronje  got labeled as a disgraced cricketer ever since. Having got caught red-handed, a crest fallen Hansie died in a chopper crash a few days later

In the aftermath of this forgetful incident in cricket, I felt cricket would become cleaner and those players who had been indulging in such heinous acts would learn to be honest. This was how it was upto a point of time. There were no such talks of match fixing thereafter for sometime.  But it was not to be. My hope of seeing a cleaner sport got evaporated soon. I saw on many instances that “fixing” had already become the order of the day. I realized that this had been there all the time and I am quite confident that such “nuggets”are still existing even if the latest sinners, Butts and Asifs are jailed.

These two disgraceful people in cricket, I am sure, are going to name a few more of their team mates as their accomplices. So, what are we going to do then? Will we ever be confident henceforth on seeing any no ball being bowled or a six hit off the last ball in a match that those sensational occurrences were genuine? I really doubt so. I am sure we are going to doubt every player from hereon if he is a cleanest player or not whenever he gets out on a crucial situation or whenever he gives 15 to 20 runs in an over atleast. So, mere jailing of these two is not going to clean the game. I have no idea what ICC is going to do. But all I can say what ICC has failed to do.

Even before when Hansie Cronje’s episode took place, there was a former captain of Pakistan who, after a few days of his retirement, admitted in public that he used to tamper the cricket ball using glass bottles during the match. Did ICC try to do anything at that time? A few years later, two Australian cricket players, who were now recognized as legends, had boldly admitted that they used to give information on pitches to bookies prior to matches. Can anyone think ICC doing anything at that time against such players?

These two things, what I have mentioned, should have been seen as symptoms for something big which was going to happen. Just like if a doctor overlooks any small symptoms it develops into a bigger disease, the same way, since ICC had not taken these things seriously, we ended up seeing episodes involving Hansie Cronje, Asif, Butt etc.

If only, ICC had reacted at those times, inflicting severe punishment on those players then this type of crime would not have been repeated. If these things were nipped on the bud with punitive measures as hard as they could take then this sort of incidents would not have happened at all. ICC was really lenient to the core and so now we are used to seeing such things happening almost regularly and every now and then a fresh case of fixing gets reported.

All I say at this juncture is whatever had happened thus far are just nightmares that ICC should try to forget. If ICC had to protect this game, getting ruled by book makers, they should review their clauses in cricket with regards to punishment and come out hard on players so that every one of them was left to think twice before doing such shameful acts.

Lets see if ICC can really take some initiative that allows only gentlemen to play this game.