Is the ‘line’ clear now? After weeks of debate over what constitutes acceptable behaviour, Australian cricket finds itself in a place so rough that even sandpaper will not help. Pushed to the edge by a resurgent South Africa, in a series marred by tension and confrontations, Australia’s desperation took it to places well beyond the line. Now, it is clear who crossed it.
When vice-captain David Warner confronted and baited South Africa’s Quinton de Kock at the first test in Durban, the Australian camp was quick to brush the episode aside by claiming that no other country could boast of a better record when it came to on-field conduct since Steve Smith undertook the captaincy. The skipper and his deputy were proud of this record – the same Smith and Warner who found themselves sacked while the test match in Cape Town rolled on.
Australia’s ignominy might be at odds with their otherwise clean record under the ICC Code of Conduct but the absence of sanctions does not reflect the slide precipitated by the culture fostered within the team. Coach Darren Lehmann is responsible for building a team that often does not care for its public perception as long as the powers that be do not take a dim view of its actions.
Lehmann’s recent words bear retelling in this regard: “From my point of view we’ve had no issues with it (the code of conduct) in the past. We normally put up our hand and move on and that’s just the way it’s been. They give you a charge overnight and you make a decision from there, and that’s how it’s been since I’ve been involved anyway. Each country to their own really on that one.”
Under the revamped system of sanctions under the code, which has been in place since September 2016, Australian players had been found guilty only twice until this series. In South Africa, though, David Warner and Nathan Lyon were reprimanded after the first test. Now, we have the ball-tampering controversy that has precipitated the suspension of Steve Smith for the final test and a severe fine for the fall-guy Cameron Bancroft.
According to the ICC’s revamped sanctions under the Code of Conduct, players are docked demerit points after the level of offence is determined by the match referee. Over a period of 24 months, a suspension could follow for a player if their demerit points add up to a greater penalty. The punitive system ensures that demerit points are not wiped out for two years even after a ban is served, thus ensuring that repeat offenders are likelier to invite more suspensions.
The revamp was forced as players were found to be accepting of fines from match referees if it meant that a ban was avoided. A player could also escape a ban by violating different clauses in the code without meeting the threshold required for suspension. But according to the rules now in place, Smith and Bancroft are going to carry the charges for the next two years.
Bancroft as executioner
It is uncharted territory for a team that has nurtured positive relationships with match referees in recent years, mainly by not questioning their observations and charges. Manager Gavin Dovey, coach Lehmann (who sits on the ICC Cricket Committee) and James Sutherland, Cricket Australia CEO, are often credited for this clean record. It is the legacy of the 2008 Andrew Symonds-Harbhajan Singh racism controversy, as noted by ESPN Cricinfo’s Daniel Brettig, which altered Australian attitudes towards the Code of Conduct, procedures and match officials.
“Since that time, the Australian team has been on an individual journey in terms of on-field behaviour; attempting a less hostile approach for some years before being given more licence by Cricket Australia’s Board and management in 2013. But they have also evolved a sense of letting the umpires and match referees decide what behaviour is appropriate and what is not,” Brettig wrote.
The transgression is obvious now. However, the actual offence of ball-tampering is not as bad as the manner in which it was carried out. It speaks volumes about the culture of the Australian side that it chose one of its youngest member to carry the act out. Bancroft, the upstart playing only his eighth test, was a willing accomplice but he was hung out to dry.
The orchestrated attempt to gain an undue advantage by the so-called ‘leadership group’ – whose members were unnamed by skipper Smith but which has featured vice-captain Warner and bowlers Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood in the past — will be an enduring example of poor leadership.
But it is coach Lehmann’s role that should come under the utmost scrutiny. Match footage suggested that it was his message that substitute fielder Peter Handscomb passed on to Bancroft before the attempt to tamper the ball was made. It is difficult to see how the conspiracy was hatched without Lehmann’s involvement.
The incident has expectedly been followed by a sense of schadenfreude outside Australia – so low is the standing of the men’s side in the world of cricket. Even the Australian government could not help but weigh in on the issue. The country’s Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull expressed his displeasure at the turn of events while the Australian Sports Commission (ASC), a government institution, asked for Smith to be sacked.
The expression of horror is a response to longstanding concerns about the Australian team’s conduct. It was only a few weeks ago that the incidents in Durban forced Sutherland to remind the players to check their on-field behaviour. “As the Preamble states, cricket is a game that owes much of its unique appeal to the fact that it should be played not only within its laws, but also within the Spirit of the Game,” he said as part of his statement.
It is this spirit that Smith was found to have violated by match referee Andy Pycroft. The Australian skipper was given the maximum punishment in accordance with the rules. Bancroft was perhaps treated differently because he was, as he unthinkingly said, “in the wrong place at the wrong time”.
The moral panic
There was, of course, no right place to do it. If the incident had somehow slipped under the scanner, it is likely the Australian team would have carried on as if nothing happened. As Lyon said a few months ago, he and his teammates are mindful of the line but they do “head-butt the line” wherever possible.
This is Lehmann’s legacy as coach. He has nurtured an atmosphere where a hyper-masculine culture and flirting with the boundaries of ethics and rules is deemed acceptable. The players do get offended by remarks about their wives, as de Kock and fans at Newlands (Cape Town) found out, but everything else that does not invite punishments is welcome. Closer home, this incident should serve as a lesson for Virat Kohli and Ravi Shastri, who have themselves fostered a culture not dissimilar from the Aussies.
As witnessed now, playing fast and loose with codes and conventions guides a team to a slippery slope. When faced with a potentially series-defining defeat, Australia decided to push the line a bit more. This time, though, the team’s feet were over the line. “We’ve seen the ball reversing quite a lot throughout this series and our ball just didn’t look like it was going to go,” Smith said in his mea culpa press conference.
Amusingly, the Australians failed in their conspiracy, too, as South Africa sped away. Such was Australia’s ineptness at ball-tampering that one was tempted to believe skipper Smith’s assertion that this was actually the first time his team had attempted it. Bancroft’s use of tape, initially thought to be sandpaper, was a gimmick best reserved for tawdry circus shows. “We had a discussion during the break and I saw an opportunity to use some tape, get some granules from rough patches on the wicket to change the ball condition, it didn’t work, the umpires didn’t change the ball,” the opening batsman said.
While Australia grapples with its tattered reputation, the controversy presents an opportunity to debate the merits of ball-tampering. Despite the hand-wringing, it is necessary to note that ball-tampering is a mere infringement of the rules. A team can be punished five runs for it while the guilty player is charged under the code of conduct. While the non-application of penalty runs for Australia was a cop-out by the umpires, the possibility to change the rules should be explored.
Many experts and former cricketers have asked for it to be legalised, with only certain foreign objects, like bottle-tops, not permitted. Saliva, dirt, mints and nails have been used for a long time without significantly tilting the balance in the bowler’s favour. Notably, when South African skipper Francois “Faf” du Plessis was fined his entire match fee for using the mint in his mouth to shine the ball in 2006, Smith was uncritical of his counterpart. “We shine the ball the same way,” the Australian captain had said.
In fact, such is the need to redress the balance that legalising ball-tampering could be an egalitarian move. Current rules and conditions are often found to favour the batsmen. Bowlers have especially suffered on account of flatter wickets and shorter boundaries in this century.
At the same time, a change in rules is unlikely for now. Ball-tampering is often accompanied by a moral panic. Cricket ties itself up in knots with a puritan desire to treat rules and age-old traditions as the same. But as we often see, rules and codes undergo significant changes with time. Administrators must respond to the game and legalising ball-tampering will not tarnish whatever remains sacrosanct to the game of cricket.
Under the current rules, however, Australia finds itself guilty and embarrassed. More than anyone else, Lehmann is responsible for encouraging practices that eventually led to the throwing of Australian cricket’s reputation under the bus. His past transgressions include a racial outburst against Sri Lankans and a call for abuse of an opposition player (Stuart Broad). Separated by a decade, those incidents provided a glimpse into Lehmann’s worldview.
The ball-tampering incident must be the final straw. A line needs to be drawn under his tenure now.
Priyansh is a sports writer in Delhi.