Cricket on its knees after being kicked in the balls...

Per request of my small, but apparently devoted, readership (Manu, Sandy, Neeraj) - the Pakistan ball tampering matter.

Cricket is a funny type of world sport mainly consisting of teams from England and former colonies of the British Empire: India, Pakistan, West Indies, Australia, New Zealand etc. As such, there has long been this undercurrent of ex-colonies vs former oppressor in games, especially where England plays India or Pakistan. When Viv Richards was in his prime and hit a magnificent hundred off about 56 balls again England, this was done in the context of the numerous race riots taking place in various inner cities in England. Much in the same way as Muhammed Ali provided a focal point (amongst others) for race riots and the civil rights movement in the US ("No vietcong never called me a ni**er") so Viv provided some sort of idol to British West Indians taking pride in beating the English at their own game.

There is a long history of certain umpires appearing to give biased decisions against South Asian teams and Darrel Hair has been at the centre of many of those decisions. He no-balled Murali 7 times in a match in Sri Lanka which has meant that he has found it hard getting a visa back into Sri Lanka thereafter. Murali, of course, has now shown the world, via a metal cast over his elbow, that he does not actually chuck the ball and hopefully the cricketing world will accept him for the absolute genius that he is. Hair gave Inzi out in Pakistan recently when he took evasive action after Harmison rifled a ball which had been blocked back to him straight at the stumps. For an instinctive reaction to avoid a ball hitting him in his stomach, Inzi was given out. Pakistan complained about Hair but still the ICC assigned him the past two tests between England and Pakistan. What he did this time appears to be unforgivable. There does not seem to have been any evidence that the ball was tampered with and the fact that only Inzi has been charged (in his capacity as Captain, therefore the whole Pakistan team) shows that they don't have any idea who did it, let alone whether it was done at all. Without any warning, he effectively gave England a five run penalty due to Pakistan cheating.

Personally I don't think that's on, given the serious allegation and the fact that Pakistan have been accused of this before. When Pakistan were reverse swinging their way to thrashing England in the early 90's, they were accused of cheating and it was said that you couldn't reverse swing without tampering with the ball. When England won the Ashes last year, due primarily to reverse swing, it was termed the art of a genius. Go figure.

Pakistan were entirely justified in staging a mini-protest and the fact that the game was called off by the umpires even though the players were already to start again beggars belief. Hopefully, Hair won't be umpiring a Pakistan game any time soon.

In other sports news, how much of a true genius is Tiger Woods? 12 out of 12 times when he has lead a major in the third round, he has won the whole thing. That is an absolutely incredible statistic.

C-Rap

Modern rap is crap, isn't it? I can't think of a decent rap song in the past five years or so. And, I don't mean the rap or hip-hop which is essentially rn'b with a bit of a rap thrown in. Hey Ya! is probably one of the better songs released by a Hip-hop band but it (and the album) owed much more to Prince than to rap. I started, in my nerdish way, while listening to an old A Tribe Called Quest song on my ipod today, to make a mental list of my favourite 10 rap songs, which were pure rap songs - just rhyming over backing music and came up with these. Feel free to disagree or to make nominations.

"Can I Kick It?" by A Tribe Called Quest - I know, I know, I've been unduly influenced by listening to them today, but this is a great song. Funny, intelligent and with great singalongability. ATCQ have been a favourite of mine for a while. I remember asking my friend Gita to buy their first album for me for my, I think, 18th birthday. I remember giving her the title and getting this look as though I was a bit mad. But she dutifully bought it for me and I played the record continuously until I left the vinyl in the sun one day and the album warped.

"What's Going On?" - the Jungle Brothers. Fantastic sample of Marvin Gaye's classic. Best line: "If I should die before I wake, take me to heaven cos I need a break". My friend, Pete recommended the jungle brother's album to me when we were at school. Pete was always into these obscure (at least in my naive public school eyes) reggae and hip hop artists and I remember driving through Tunbridge Wells in his ford fiesta blaring "Fuck Tha Police" by NWA out of the car stereo. We were such rebels. Anyway, this recommendation was spot on.

"Guilty Conscience" by Eminem and Dr Dre. It's always the lyrics with Eminem. How to say "social commentary" without sounding too pretentious?

"Gin n Juice" by Snoop. Preferably the version played on Radio Nova. Although it does have the line about it being "six in the morning and my momma ain't home" - real hardcore, having a party while mum's away...

"So Watcha Want" by the Beastie Boys. Hammond Organ, white boys shouting - what more do you want?

"I could just kill a man" by Cypress Hill - "I got the clearance to run the interference" best lyric that means absolutely nothing... (props to my bro on this one)

"Nouveau Western" by MC Solaar - come on, I had to get some pretentious French rap in there.

"Eye know" by De La Soul - I know I'm showing a bias towards the acid jazz type rap but really that's just a personal preference. But it doesn't take away from the fact that this is the song that brought rap to the masses.

"The Missing Link" by Del tha funky homosapien, featuring Dinosaur Jr. From the soundtrack to "Judgment Night", a very crappy film with great music. Obscure-ish, but absolutely superb. Del is one of the most distinctive rap voices ever; I had a bet with Sandy B that it was Del who rapped on that Gorillaz song - I think it was Clint Eastwood, but I could be absolutely wrong - and, of course, I won.

"The Next Episode" by Dr Dre/"Typical American" by The Goats. A paen to high living vs a Philly rap band with a social conscience. They both have a punch like Mohammed Ali and can't be separated. The Goats probably sneaks ahead on the basis that it is a true rap song without any of that rnb singing in the Dre song.

anyway, those are my ten; please disagree.

World War III

We've been rocked by thunderstorms the past day or two with the windows in my office at one point dangerously close to blowing in. Still, it's nothing compared to the Lebanese and the Israelis. I know that we're all supposed to be objective and even handed but statistics never lie - at least 10 times more civilians killed in Lebanon than in Israel. The question occurs to me: does anyone in power anywhere have any sense? My department at work is 'dispute resolution' and I don't think any of the so-called world leaders would even manage a job as office junior.

Actually, I think that not crediting Bush, Blair, Olmert and Nasrallah with any sense is really underestimating them - they know exactly what they are doing. CNN reported that Hizbollah has rockets from Iran and Syria which have a range of 60 km. What on earth is Israel doing bombing Beirut which is clearly more than 60km from the border? CNN have also reported that Hizbollah "are using tactics and weapons to their advantage" - as if it is unfair that they are not just lying down and dying.

Of course it stupid of Hizbollah to kidnap Israeli soldiers. But, there are stories - unconfirmed I guess - that the soldiers were in fact in Lebanon and were not taken from Israel. Whatever the story is, the attacking of military targets has to be distinguished from the killing of innocent civilians. There comes a point where, even if one agress that Lebanese civilians are not being targetted deliberately, the killing of civilians by accident is no excuse or justification.

Israel says Hizbollah is firing its rockets from civilian areas but has anyone actually put forward any evidence of this? I have seen pictures of dead children but no mangled rocket launchers and you would have thought that if there were documentary evidence to support this claim, we would have seen those pictures plastered over the tv and newspapers.

the other thing that occurred to me watching and reading the news is that the ceasefire planned (ha!) only asks Israel to stop "offensive operations". This is contrasted with acts of self-defence which Israel is still allowed to pursue. Given that Israel, the US and Blair have always characterised the Israeli response as 'self-defense' does this mean that the ceasefire will have little effect?

What is the endgame here? To get Iran and Syria involved? To rid of the world of muslims? of jews? can anyone help?