One of the most notable facets of professional cricket is the wide variety of ways which it finds to shoot itself in the foot, proof of which if proof were needed could readily be found in the farcical ending of the England-v-New Zealand one day international at Edgbaston on 18 June. No one even the Kiwis would claim that the playing conditions in the later stages were anything other than miserable but for the umpires to call the match off as a “no result” with but a single over to be bowled to achieve a result one way or the other defied all commonsense – but whoever said that commonsense should feature in the equation.
It is hardly surprising that the New Zealanders should feel hard done by as they needed only 7 more runs in the unbowled 20th over for victory and it is to their considerable credit that they did not make an issue of the deplorably slow rate at which England bowled their overs.
The spectators who were there at the end are just as entitled as the New Zealand team to feel cheated that a result was not achieved. Who could complain if many of them chose not to return?
One of the most notable facets of professional cricket is the wide variety of ways which it finds to shoot itself in the foot, proof of which if proof were needed could readily be found in the farcical ending of the England-v-New Zealand one day international at Edgbaston on 18 June. No one even the Kiwis would claim that the playing conditions in the later stages were anything other than miserable but for the umpires to call the match off as a “no result” with but a single over to be bowled to achieve a result one way or the other defied all commonsense – but whoever said that commonsense should feature in the equation.
It is hardly surprising that the New Zealanders should feel hard done by as they needed only 7 more runs in the unbowled 20th over for victory and it is to their considerable credit that they did not make an issue of the deplorably slow rate at which England bowled their overs.
The spectators who were there at the end are just as entitled as the New Zealand team to feel cheated that a result was not achieved. Who could complain if many of them chose not to return?