Why - this Hair/ICC/Pakistan has had nothing to with cricket anyway - it was all politics, and nothing else.

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Ern

Nearly Ern,

from Cricinfo - Mali: Hair 'could umpire Tests again'

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Mark.

I am not sure about that Pie Chucker. The President of the New Zealand Cricket Board is on record blaming Hair for the whole fiasco. In his words, Hair's call was (link) Doesn't seem like it was all about down to commercial considerations then, does it. The blame lies with the person who made what most others perceive to be an appalling and unfair decision.


PS: that link in your post doesn't seem to work

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A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes
Mark Twain

The way Hair managed the situation at the Oval was, IMO poor, but 100% correct regarding the laws. The ICC now realise that and they now have handled this situation poorly. The ICC should have acknowledged that Hair was correct but recommeded in future that the umpires should try to keep the game going...

The quote i posted up ( the link works OK for me - could it be a cricinfo UK thing??) was made by the NZ chief in Hairs hearing. In that case I find it hard to believe that the tribunal will find against Hair. One of the guys who was involved in his firing had admitted it wasnt for cricket reasons and that he is still regarded as a good umpire.

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Mark.

It is not so much the rights and the wrings of the umpires' decision at The Oval that is in question. Even if Hair & Doctrove were considered 'wrong', that should have only lead to an equal official reprimand for both, no more. But the issue here is that Hair has been very blatantly singled out to be blamed by the ICC and in a manner disproportionate to the sequence of events. For an official governing body to do that, IMO, is extremely provocative and morally wrong. I never cared much for the ICC, but the current version is the absolute pits.

All that may be true Nostromo, or it may not be - you have your opinion and there is an equally valid counter-argument to that.

That is not my concern, though. The question being raised is that Hair was treated the way he was, either (a) out of racist motives, as he is a white Australian, or (b) for commercial considerations, due to India's financial clout.

I think both (a) and (b) and nonsensical. Hair was treated the way he was because of his long and controversial history with most of the non Anglo-Saxon cricketing nations, and the perception, (unproven, of course, but then so is all perception) that he was not entirely unbiased over his long umpiring career.

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A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes
Mark Twain

Case dropped!!

Cricinfo - Hair drops racial discrimination case against ICC

Big surprise,then again they may have reached an out of court settlement which suits both parties and are keeping that quiet.

I doubt they would say its unconditional if there was an out of court settlement! Hair likes to mouth off to the media and comes across as a very arrogant so-and-so; he wouldn't keep it quiet if there was a settlement.

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A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes
Mark Twain

Keeping quiet about it is one thing; denying the existence of any agreement, as the report does, is quite another. Certainly the background is unclear, but it looks as though Darrell Hair dropped the case with no settlement. Or, to be more concise, he lost. I suspect there may be more reporting on this in the coming days.

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Money won't buy you friends. But it gets you a better class of enemy.
Spike Milligan