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I recently read a column from Fairfax cricket correspondent Andrew Wu calling for an end to the nickname ‘Chinaman’.
As any cricket fan would know, a chinaman bowler is a left-armer who bowls wrist spin, a rare bowling art most recently pulled off in Test cricket by young Indian debutant Kuldeep Yadav.
The story of where the nickname came from, as with much of cricket folklore, is disputed – but whether the story is real or not doesn’t really matter.
As a middle class white male aged between 18 and 49, I’m basically excluded from any discussion about what can or cannot be construed as offensive by anyone on Earth. Just for the record, though, without going into any discussion about whether or not the term is used in a derogatory sense or if it can be construed as offensive, if even one person finds the term offensive towards Chinese people, then I believe we have a duty to rename it.
The term doesn’t even really make sense. It has nothing to do with cricket. The closest connection China has to the noble sport is the fact that it invented tea and we honour that invention with a twenty-minute break after 60 overs devoted to it.
It isn’t even an accurate description of the delivery. As a left-arm wrist-spinner/wicketkeeper myself, a more accurate picture would be ‘Quasimodo giving birth to a frog in a blender’.
So here are six alternative nicknames to the chinaman that I reckon are much more appropriate for the cricketing phrasebooks.
1. The Southpaw
Pretty stock-standard for lefties. It’s used in boxing and baseball and some other sports as well. But it’s also pretty bland and uninspiring, which is the exact opposite of the bowling we’re renaming.
It’s a perfect nickname for what Stephen O’Keefe bowls, however. So let’s call left-arm finger-spinning ‘left-arm Southpaw’ and move on.
2. The Chuck
Leslie O’Brien Fleetwood-Smith was a left-arm unorthodox bowler for Australia during the 1930s, but of course we all know him by his nickname of ‘Chuck’. So why not honour him by naming the bowling style he made famous, the Chuck?
Yes, he only played ten Tests and yes, he holds the record for the most expensive figures in Test history (1/298 from 87 overs in case you were wondering), but read about the delivery he bowled to dismiss Wally Hammond in the Melbourne Test of the 1936-37 Ashes and then tell me he doesn’t deserve the honour.
And then if Kuldeep Yadav and Ravi Ashwin ever bowl in tandem, commentators can say there are ‘Chucks’ at both ends! (I’m kidding, I’m kidding.)
3. The Hoggy
Never heard of “Chuck” Fleetwood-Smith? Well then, surely you’ve heard of George Bradley Hogg, more commonly known as Brad Hogg. What is it with these left-arm unorthodox bowlers and their refusal to accept their given names?
You can’t hate Hoggy. Whether it’s the fact that he’s always smiling, or that tongue wave he does in the BBL when he gets a wicket, or just that he played in almost as many World Cup Final victories as he did Tests for Australia, he’s just a loveable guy.
Give his autobiography a read and remember him fondly every time you hear someone say ‘This guy’s a Hoggy’.
4. The Enraw
This one might not make any sense whatsoever, so I’ll clarify: it’s ‘Warne’ spelt backwards.
Reverse-Warne. The most famous right-arm leg-spinner of all time as seen through a mirror. Which is basically what a left-arm wrist-spinner is. Logic.
And plus, there’s no way anyone in Australia will ever pronounce something like this without an ‘ee’ on the end, and ‘Enrawie’ is a bit of a mouthful. Calling it a ‘Roarie’ would definitely increase traffic on this website from confused batsmen googling what the umpire said the bowler was.
Either that, or it would just really irritate everyone named Rory.
5. The Flanders
Cricket is disappointingly short of Simpsons-inspired terminology, but I reckon renaming this delivery after Springfield’s most famous leftie would be “okily-dokily-doo!” I’ll stop now.
6. The Achong
Andrew Wu actually came up with this one himself in his column, so I’ll give it a fair run here.
It’s named in honour of West Indian left-arm wrist-spinner Ellis ‘Puss’ Achong, who allegedly was the inspiration for the term in 1933 after dismissing English batsman Walter Robbins.
Robbins muttered as he was walking off ‘Fancy being done by a bloody Chinaman’, which has been attributed as the birth of the nickname – although as we said, this is disputed.
I’m sceptical, though. Yes, it’s historically and even racially significant, as Achong was the first Chinese-born Test cricketer. But thanks to my knowledge of Aussie vernacular, as I mentioned up above with the addition of the ‘ee’ on the end of every word, then I have a distinct feeling an ‘Achong’ will, among some people, become a ‘Chongie’, which is somehow even worse than the current name.
And do I even need to go over why calling it a ‘Puss’ isn’t a whole lot better?
So there you have it. Six alternate names to the ‘Chinaman’ which make much more sense and, importantly, can’t be construed as racially insensitive to anyone with any remote connection to the country that we owe billions in debt to and who we really can’t afford to antagonise.
I like the Chuck or the Hoggy, myself, but if you readers prefer one of the other four, or you think I missed a goodie, then let me know in the comments.
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