Ben Stokes and Jos Buttler abuse cases evidence of a serious problem

It seems odd to me in this day of full time professionalism, when sport IS their job, coupled with increased focus on OHS in the workplace, irrespective of what the workplace is, that the blind eye is continued to be applied. The #MeToo movement relating to acting/entertainment has probably broken the back of selective work industries being excluded from imposing standard and acceptable societal norms re a safe working environment. I wouldn’t be surprised to see sport, particularly footy, follow suit in the near future. I mean, if sports persons are now retrospectively pursuing failure of duty of care outcomes from sports associations related to concussion, surely unrelated on-field physical brutality that causes injury has to go down the same path?

I'm guessing that was a massive accident that one. I'm sure they didn't intend to put that up to make sure the Indian team didn't get the benefit of a poor umpiring decision!

I have thought that sometimes. If, for instance, an NRL player, just out of nowhere, started laying into an opposition player on the ground with punch after punch in a largely unprovoked attack, why aren't they charged with assault just because it's in a footy game?

To some extent the issue isn't that the broadcasters prefer to show the home side in a better light than the visiting side, except for the fact that ICC penalties are so often based on the video evidence that broadcaster comes up with. So without doctoring footage, just selective editing that only shows one side of things, they can make a situation where the home player has said worse stuff than the visiting player just look like the visiting player has abused the home player and get them banned! Probably the answer to this is for the match referee to insist on seeing all related footage before assigning penalties, not just doing it based on the limited footage the home broadcaster chose to show. Unfortunately, in some cases the footage wouldn't be there unless they went looking in the first place. For instance, the Cape Town ball tampering incident, they had to be explicitly following the players closely with cameras through the breaks between overs, which they don't normally do, in order to pick that up. So unless they are explicitly looking for things like that from both sides, the footage wouldn't exist.

Yeah, I can see that sort of thing happening. Maybe not full doctoring, but certainly editing the video to show just the portions that make things look a lot worse than they really are. Like the video showing the person telling Scott Morrison he's not their prime minister, and leaving out the part where they say that's because they are English not Australian. Just leave out a prime bit of the video and the whole thing can take on a different connotation very quickly. Showing the video of the visiting player abusing the local player while leaving out the part where the local player said something far worse first etc.

The issue is that your average beered up South African watching cricket is an awful human being

All home broadcasters are biased. Don't know there's much you can do about that. You get some commentators better than others at just talking reasonably dispassionately about both sides of the game, but more often than not that's because it's someone like Michael Holding commentating on the Ashes, so he has no affiliation with either side. Unfortunately, broadcasters always want to talk up the home team also, as building that nationalistic pride and such helps more people want to watch and cheer on their home team. I don't imagine it would go down too well for a host broadcaster to be constantly undermining the home team. It would be nice if there was a way that the broadcasters could all be forced to equally police both sides for these sorts of infringements, but I can't imagine it will ever happen. Of course, things like clashes with people in the crowd are always more likely to happen to visiting teams too, as home crowds rarely have people going hard at the home players.

I agree eye 2 eye. . We’re it any other English player telling a spectator to take a hike it would have not even been reported. But Stokes has a reputation he has earned entirely on his own. So threatening physical violence in full view of all wasn’t particularly smart. It was newsworthy understandably but should have just warranted a quite behind the scenes word with his management. But it became silly suspensions and a mountain out of an African anthill.

Not slightly angry. You said you were being sarcastic. I said it was the lowest form of wit ( which it is universally agreed that it is ) but if you say so. Quite obvious who is angry. Have a great day Viv.

Of course the game is being over policed, this is the 21st Century where it's about how bad a look anything but bland behaviour on field may look to young kids and puritans who never show passion in anything they attempt. Administrators respond to contrived negative publicity in this preventative era. It's the era where batsmen can die by the sword 'because that's the way they play', but the wide range of human emotion is unacceptable on a sporting field. Nobody expects Rabada and others not to be penalised when they genuinely lose it, but administrators have taken context out of the equation, while also adding innocuous celebrations to the list of 'offences'. All this while not sanctioning members whose spectators are the ones openly abusing players.

If I'm honest, I thought it had been a bit of a bad tempered series with both sides trying to wind up the other.

One thing I do know, as I see that Broad has just been fined and given his second demerit point over the past 24-month period (2 to go until he gets a one-match holiday) - if this sereis is any guide to the future, we may see a whole lot of Test players getting suspensions. By common consent, it hasn't actually been a particularly heated series, has generally been played in a good spirit, and yet five players have been fined and given a one-point warning. In Rabada's case, this led to a suspension, Broad's on his way to one and others will almost certainly follow from various countries in futire years. God only knows how many demerits and suspensions might have been racked up by past players. What would you get today for hurling an aluminium bat the legth of a pitch (Lillee), getting into a fight with Javed Miandad (Lillee again), as captain telling your batting partner to leave the pitch with you when you diagree with being given out (Gavaskar), refusing to leave the field when given out (Chris Broad), whacking your stumps with your bat after getting bowled (Chris Broad again), knocking off bails with your hand and then appealing for hit-wicket (Langer) or as captain, telling a Pakistani umpire that he's a cheat (Gatting). Other examples from the past occur, I'm sure - WG Grace replacing the bails after being bowled and telling the umpires to get on with the game, perhaps?!. Players are emphatically no worse today than they used to be. The microscope under which they operate, as the author of this piece points out, is much more unforgiving than it once was.

Rather use the lowest form of wit to make a point than be an angry man

The crowd were just wearing Sonny Bill Williams masks. They're just paper masks. No obscenities, no abuse, no violence. The aim was to unsettle Warner and it worked superbly.

Stop spreading clearly racist rhetoric then you hypocrite.

I doubt 250 people "sexually harassed" Candice. Maybe a few dozen at the most but wearing a SBW doesn't constitute sexual harassment nor do a few cricket executives having photos taken with cricket fans warrant dismissal. So maybe ease off the social justice a bit bro unless perhaps you're in favour of re-instituting witch hunts?

Hard to argue with your first point - although I thought Butler would not have fallen into this category (perhaps he's proved me wrong). On your second point, TV broadcasters should be held to account for all of their influence - without the broadcasting rights, they have nothing. They should report fairly on all aspects of the game and if it is not in their contracts now the administrators have again failed the sports public. This raises the question "who determines what is fair?" The only answer to that can be the international governing body (in this case the ICC). So if the ICC determine that broadcaster A has deliberately displayed bias therefore bringing the game into disrepute, they should lose their broadcasting rights or at least suffer significant penalty. Surely, there must be something in these contracts or are the administrators too keen to get their hands on their bonuses?

It's generally the more "Dense" Cricketers getting themselves in trouble. I'm not sure the TV broadcasters should be held responsible for Low IQ international Cricketers?

Safer workplace for some, not all then. You’re predicating your response on the idea that a player who is sledged has no come back. Not true. It doesn’t excuse personal abuse by a player and Warner is no exception, but that is completely different to abuse coming over the fence which is what this is all about, as Stokes was abused from the stands.

Remember when Inzi waded into the crowd to remonstrate with a spectator after the guy kept calling him a fat potato over a megaphone?