Damp conditions at Guwahati meant that the 5th game of the series had to be called off without even a single ball being bowled. This resulted in unruly crowd behaviour and some arrests. My question is should the game have been played? After the supersoppers and helicopter had tried in vain to dry the ground parts of it were still deemed to be a little slippery. The cover region, the slips area and bowlers runups were still wet and slippery. This led to the captains decision that the players would have risked injury by playing.

Is this a good advertisment for cricket considering footballers play in such conditions routinely and have to make sudden sideways movements all the time during play? If the bowlers and fielders wore appropriate footware with stops or spikes to gain purchase in the ground what is the problem? The ball will get damp as it travels across the ground but it can be towelled off before it is bowled and if it becomes too soggy it can be replaced with a dry ball.

My feeling is that as long as there are no puddles of water then play should be possible. I'm speaking in terms of ODIs only where I feel the playing conditions shouldn't be as stringent as Test matches. I feel as long as it's not raining and the light is good enough matches should go ahead despite a damp outfield. However, I'd like your thoughts on this. Please vote in the public poll.

I agree with you to an extent. Your point about football players is quite valid. One thing is that Cricketers are not as fit as football players. A Sehwag, if falls, will hurt himself more than a Beckham. But thats not an excuse.

__________________
My computer can beat me at chess.....but its no match for me at kick boxing.

I very much doubt that any player who plays test cricket as well as ODI's would really appreciate an increased risk of injury just to play one extra game. If they got a serious injury they would not only have caused themselves an injury which could have been avoided had they not played but also miss out on X test matches and stop progression of their skills.

I'm not saying that a player can't get injured any day of the week or that players are guaranteed to get injured if they play when conditions are not great. But the chances of a bowler tripping on the follow through with damp soles on their boots on their follow through, or in the outfield with little grip. This is not five overs aside in the English Twenty20 competition, bowlers only having to bowl one over. This is 50 overs aside, much more serious cricket for some countries where they put 100% effort into it and quicker bowlers have to bowl up to 10 overs at full pace.

Both captains agreed that they the conditions were too dangerous to play, we complain that the workload of cricketer's is far too high. Why not, when they get the chance allow them to have a break if the natural world gives them it?

The only damp ground I could ever really live with would be if it's mainly just the outfield, the fielders generally sliding about most of the game so why not make things easier.

__________________
Watch this for a perfect about.
James May

I couldn't have put it better myself. I have played in such conditions and believe it or not, you do end up slipping over a lot more than you do wearing football boots. You cannot wear such 'grippy' boots as you would cut up the pitch substantially by wearing grippy enough boots. If you've seen some of C4's slow motion replays of bowlers, you can see the bowlers front foot slide, albeit just a little. If this happens on a wet wicket, then that slip may extend and cause groin strains etc.

I got mightily annoyed that we were playing in such wet conditions, and the guy I was batting with slipped over twice. I really cannot see that professionals should be playing in any conditions that the umpire thinks are not good enough. The other thing to consider is that players insurance companies may not allow them to play in such conditions.

Footballers do not rely on anything requiring "rhythm": bowlers approaching the crease are engaging in an activity more reminiscent of triple-jump than of soccer.

Close fielding is also more dangerous than anything undertaken in most other mainstream sports... and if a slip fielder or silly point loses his footing when in close to a spinner... a broken wrist / fingers is a distinct possibility... and there remains a distict possibility of near decapitation: a broken jaw or concussion following a slip is NOT likely in soccer!

This is all quite aside from the increased risk of the sort of injury that put Simon Jones out of cricket for over a year.

Brett Lee hits the pitch with something like the force of 4x to that of his own body weight?

Imagine him slipping at that kind of force onto a rock hard pitch and I don't think we would be seeing him bowl again unless he was very lucky.

If he managed to get some forward rolling momentum as he slid along he could smack his head into the ground, if that's not dangerous I'll eat my metaphorical hat.

__________________
Watch this for a perfect about.
James May

If you drive on wet roads you adjust your driving to suit the more hazardous conditions. I propose the same commonsense be applied to ODIs in damp conditions in order to get some kind of game played. Obviously, a Brett Lee type bowler is not going to be suited by the conditions so pick players who are: guys with short run ups and slower bowlers, spinners & medium pacers. What's important is to play a game. I think the crowd would prefer any game than no game so play to the conditions. It can be done with appropriate footware. Close fielders can wear helmets if they are worried by variable bounce. Think out of the box and I'm sure there are ways to adjust the playing conditions to make the game relatively safe in damp conditions. You just have to have the will to try it and then experiment to find the best way to play the game in those conditions.

I'm actually an advocate of uncovered wickets and of players and umpires learning to deal WITHOUT the pampering they get at the moment... but I suspectthat's not for the reason you offer: I want see the above in the interests of the quality of cricket played out in the middle... whereas I get the impression you care more about the punters in the terraces and watching TV.

WhereI'd acccept that it would take the better part of a decade to get professional cricketers coached to play safely under conditions that are frequently damp... you also appear to be suggesting conditions of play should be mostly as now... but with one-off instances of damp conditions being thrown at them on a few, rare occasions.

If I thought you had noble motives for your proposal I might actually be more amenable to the notion... but it again smacks of attending tothe wrong priorities.

The umpires were concerened about the player's injury.But in football they play in any conditions,even snow.It does not matter if you get hurt.It is not going to happen all the time.

As a sportsman,they shouldn't bother about injuries,otherwise,no sport can be played.There is an injury in every sport.

__________________
Karthik Venkatesan

In football, you play your best side every game in the hope to give the best peformance. Sadly for football different players don't usually excel on different dampness levels of football pitch. oh yes, Thierry Henry is a master on the dry and slow pitch...

In cricket, you pick your best bowlers for the situation, if the outfield is damp this will usually give the pitch a little bit of moisture and possibly aid swing bowlers early on. Calling on Brett Lee to run in and bowl 95mph snorters. Only problem is, the outfield is wet so Brett Lee gets traded in for a slow bowler and never gets the opportunity to play on such a sporting wicket.

Football makes no difference what conditions you play on, you still play your best team. In cricket, you get the choice to play different players but the added risk makes it impossible to play your best bowlers because of risk?

The crowd get to see some cricket, but some of the cricketer's are unhappy at not getting to play.

__________________
Watch this for a perfect about.
James May