Jimmy ain't no good boy!!

So the great British Tamasha finally came to an end with the disciplinary ruling held yesterday declaring both Ravindra Jadeja and James Anderson not guilty for the level 3 charges that were slapped at the respective players. This ruling, which came after Ravindra Jadeja was fined for misconduct in a previous trial, ended up as nothing else but a face saver for the English cricket establishment as they wanted to save Anderson at any cost and had no option but to let Jadeja go off. But it has left a bad taste in the mouth for both the camps and the cricketing world at large.

James Anderson is famous for his on-field antics. He has had his fair share of run-ins with Mitchell Johnson during the Ashes season and the situation escalated to such a point at one time that the Aussie skipper Michael Clarke threatened Anderson about fracturing his arm when the tail-ender came out to bat. Unfortunately, Anderson carried on in the same vein against India as one could repeatedly see him looking to provoke Indian batsmen with words when his bowling was clearly falling flat on its face. He probably thought that he would get away with it one more time and was clearly taken by surprised when M.S. Dhoni stood by his team mate, especially when he was closest to the action apart from the two accused.

The presiding judge ruled that there was lack of clear video or audio evidence to prove it beyond doubt that any of the party is guilty. He also said that the eye-witnesses were “extremely biased” towards their respective sides to make it easier to reach any conclusive decision. This after Anderson had himself admitted that he had used inappropriate language and there was physical contact.

The British media as usual spared no time and pounced on the Indian team and skipper Dhoni for pressing charges against Anderson, even after N. Srinivasan advised him not to do so. They have labelled it as an act of desperation by Team India and another humiliation off the field after the drubbing they got on field in the third test.

But this incident has definitely opened a can of worms and divided the cricketing world to the core. There has been rising discontent within Asian teams regarding the treatment given to them as opposed to opposed to their Australian or English counterparts. It is also no secret that Australian and England cricket boards are jealous of the financial might and the influence that the BCCI holds over the cricketing world at large.

So even though this is not the first incident of its kind, and trust me it is definitely going to be the last one, the precedent set by this ruling can have some serious repercussions in the future. We have seen a degeneration in the level of on field behaviour over the years which is attributed to aggression, passion and other such rubbish terms. But such an incident can lead to something even worse and responsibility for that would lie squarely on the cricket administrators who are too busy in satiating their bloated egos.