Michael Parkinson's unwarranted dig at Murali
While writing about
Warne's greatness,
Michael Parkinson Myarseisintheparkinglot took a pot-shot at Murali.
In any sensible reckoning of sporting achievement he belongs in the most select company along with the aforesaid Ali, Jack Nicklaus, Pele and, dare I say it, Don Bradman. Warne has redefined the art of spin bowling every bit as much as Bradman demonstrated his mastery of batting.
The argument that Warne's reputation must be judged alongside another spin bowler who closely pursues him in the averages is not one I have any time for. In my view, Muchichuckalot will be remembered as the bowler who enforced a change in the rules to accommodate his - how shall we describe it - controversial action.
While the question of whether Murali chucks or not is a matter for debate, I think Michael Parkinson's act of bringing in Murali into the picture, merely to reinforce
his strong belief that he chucks, as reflected in the nickname he uses, was a rather shameful and cheap attack. Parkinson obviously is demeaning Murali's name when he calls him 'Muchichuckalot'. The fact that he can't pronounce 'Muralitharan' with his rolled tongue to save his life doesn't give him the right to tamper with it.
I don't think there're too many people who question Warne's greatness. But should Warne be considered great at the cost of rubbishing Murali's achievements? I think not!
Despite his
various well
chronicled off-field antics and the odd
stupid comment, there is absolutely no way you can question the man's talent and ability to perform when it counts. This has been made amply evident in
the last three months.
Just sticking to test cricket, while Murali's statistics certainly are comparable with Warne, he will always be ranked lower, perhaps even by those who do not care about his bowling action, because of his feasting on Bangladesh and Zimbabwe more often than Warne has. Remove the wickets he has taken against those two teams and Murali's bowling average goes up to 24.1 and the strike rate increases to nearly 60. While it is obviously not his fault that Sri Lanka play those two teams or that the batsmen in those two teams are so hopeless, overall Murali also averages nearly 7 less at home than he does away and his strike rate goes up by nearly an over when he is playing overseas. In Warne's case, he has only played Zimbabwe once and never against Bangladesh. Warne's difference between home and away numbers is very miniscule, if anything, he performs better outside Australia!
So even the stats do imply that Warne is a far better bowler than Murali, regardless of whether Murali is a chucker or not! But why worry about all this when we can find out in
the October face-off in the Super Series.
Previous stuff on chucking:
ICC's announcement,
Murali and his doosra,
results of the ICC study,
doosra dangers,
Murali and the World side,
Shoaib Malik cleared? and
Harbhajan cleared!Labels: chucking, murali
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