In Gods, I trust

Cricket Gods, that is. There is nothing in life, like sports, where instant justice is handed out. I am speaking from my experiences while playing for the Penn State Cricket Club, the last 3-4 years. Anytime we feel that our opponents are cheating or trying to take wrong advantage of rules, I always console myself and tell my teammates as well that, cheaters don't win. From all the different instances of such happenings, I vividly remember that being played out to be true.

Yesterday, PSCC opened their WMCB league season with a match against Chantilly CC. The team that represented us was not the very best we could send out but nonetheless, were a bunch of dedicated characters. Eventhough Chantilly were finalists from last season and boast of big centurions, we always thought we have a chance because of our team. The weather forecasts were really bad for the day. We won the toss and made 142 all out in the alloted 40 overs with Shiv top scoring (yet again!!) with 48 and some late inning charge from Ramesh, Wagla and Venky. During the innings break, there was a slight bit of rain.

Herman -playing in his first game - gave us a dream start and took 2 wickets off his first two "legal" deliveries. We knew even with our modest score, we are in for a fight. Chantilly scored at a brisk rate but kept losing wickets. There was stoppage of play due to rain in the 4th over and after that, we took 3 more wickets to leave chantilly at 82 for 5 in 18 overs. For a game not to be abandoned, atleast 20 overs have to be bowled. Chantilly CC realized if they play till the bitter end, PSCC had the better chance of winning. So, from 1oth over on, they wanted to maintain a decent runrate and hope the game is called off after 20th over. They were planning on calling "bad light" after 20th over, by which we end up losing. As luck (or cricket Gods) would have it, it started raining after the 18th over, so there was a break. The playing conditions were very bad by now with the outfield pretty wet and slippery and the cricket ball awfully wet. Anyway, after the break, we had to take the field although we knew Chantilly were gonna call off after 20 overs. Lo and Behold, the heavens opened up again after the 2nd ball of 20th over was bowled and no further play was possible. This means both teams get one point each.

There were a lot of interesting conversations and altercations/arguments that went on, which will be published in the pscc cricket blog.

There was this another instance in 2005 season, when we were hosting a team from D.C., Jamaica here at Penn State. We were defending a total of 177. There was a whole lot cheating that went on from their side when they were chasing the target. As always, we overcame that and we won very comfortably.

This also brings up0 the inevitable question: Why is there such prevalent inclination among the players to cheat? Why can't you try to win it fair and square?