Cricket and the Law: The Man in White is Always Right (Studies in Law, Society and Popular Culture, 1)

442 Pages·2003·1.83 MB·English

by  David Fraser

Cricket and the Law
Football may be the people’s game, but the quintessentially English game of cricket has a
firm place within the public’s affection with many cricketing concepts escaping the
confines of the game to carry far broader social meanings.
Cricket and the Law charts the inter-relationship between cricket—the law of the
game, and legal theory—the law of our lives. Fraser draws fascinating connections and
commonalities between these two seemingly disparate, complex sets of conventions.
This engaging study will be enjoyed by lawyers and students of law, sport, sociology
and cultural studies, as well as cricket lovers everywhere.
David Fraser is Professor of Law and Social Theory at the School of Law, Nottingham
University, UK.
Routledge Studies in Law, Society and
Popular Culture

Series Editors: Steve Greenfield and Guy Osborn
School of Law, University of Westminster, UK.
Routledge Studies in Law, Society and Popular Culture is an inter-disciplinary series that
examines the relationship between the law and all areas of popular culture. Particular foci
include the regulation of spheres of popular culture and representations of law within
popular culture. ‘popular Culture’ is a broad and inclusive church that includes all aspects
of leisure and culture, including but not confined to music, sport, film, media, night-time
economy, art, literature, the internet etc. Whilst law may well provide a useful vehicle for
an analysis of cultural activities within society the absence of law in the field may be just
as important and worthy of consideration.
The Series Editors are interested in receiving proposals and manuscripts for this series,
please contact Dr Guy Osborn or Steve Greenfield at the University of Westminster
([email protected] or [email protected]).
This is the first book in the series.
Cricket and the Law
The Man in White is Always Right
David Fraser

LONDON AND NEW YORK
First published 2005 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Avenue, New York,
NY 10016
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
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© 2005 David Fraser
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or
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in writing from the publishers.
The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with regard to the accuracy of the
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errors or omissions that may be made.
Every effort has been made to ensure that the advice and information in this book is true and
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book, you are strongly advised to consult the manufacturer’s guidelines.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been
requested
ISBN 0-203-48594-7 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-203-59047-3 (Adobe e-Reader Format)
ISBN 0-714-65347-0 (hbk)
ISBN 0-714-68285-3 (pbk)
I want to stress again one aspect of the game which is most important. Never argue
with an umpire.
—Ian Botham
I don’t understand why, in a democratic society, where government and all the
accepted standards in every walk of life are being questioned, umpires should be
immune.
—Asif Iqbal

Contents

Series editor’s preface ix
Preface xi
Foreword xv

1 Introduction 1
2 The legal theory of cricket 14
3 Lord Denning, cricket, law and the meaning of life 20
4 Dante, cricket, law and the meaning of life 24
5 Laws, not rules or cricket as adjudication 28
6 Law, codes and the spirit of the game 37
7 More law and the spirit of the game 48
8 The man in white is always right: umpires, judges and rule of law of law 64
9 Umpires, decisions and the rule of law 78
10 The man in white is always right (but he is not always neutral) 99
11 Technology, adjudication and law 104
12 Leg before wicket, causation and the rule of law 116
13 Mankad, Javed, Hilditch, Sarfraz and the rule of law 124
14 It’s not cricket: underarm bowling, legality and the meaning of life 138
15 The chucker as outlaw—legality, morality and exclusion in cricket 145
16 Murali, Shoaib and the jurisprudence of chucking 152
17 Bouncers: terror and the rule of law in cricket 186
18 Ball-tampering and the rule of law 200
19 The little master, ball-tampering and the rule of law 238
20 Delay and over-rates: temporality and the meaning of cricket 247
21 Ethical discourse, legal narrative and the meaning of cricket 255
22 You…—sledging and cricket as ethical discourse 258
23 Walking, the judicial function and the meaning of law 273
24 Other stories about cricket, law and the meaning of life 282
25 Capitalism and the meaning of cricket 309
26 Class struggle, old school tie and the meaning of cricket 317
27 The Hill, the members and others: the crowd as sub-text 321
28 Bodyline, postmodernism, law and the meaning of life 330
29 Conclusion: on life, law and cricket 335

Notes 337
Index 402
Series editor’s preface

Cricket writing has a long and distinguished history, with a breadth and depth of writing
that is almost unique within sport. The material ranges from the bio graphical to the
statistical, and the long history of cricket provides a huge wealth of material to draw
upon. Cricket as a whole is incredibly well served in terms of its literature, with examples
of books reaching beyond the compass of the sport itself and analysing broader social and
political concerns.1 Major issues such as apartheid and, more recently, the human rights
record of Zimbabwe and the political relationship between India and Pakistan have been
reflected in the playing, or abandonment, of cricket. Down notes the importance of the
game to English society thus; ‘Cricket surely deserves this special treatment since, more
than almost any other sport in England, it is woven deep into the fabric of society, its
influence embracing the most noble-born and the most humble’.2 Evidence of this can be
seen for example in the use of cricketing vernacular and metaphor within the English
language. That cricket is evocative of something broader than the game itself can be seen
in the use of cricket by politicians from Geoffrey Howe to John Major, the latter
memorably using cricket as emblematic of all, to him at least, that is great about Britain;
‘Fifty years on from now, Britain will still be the country of long shadows on county
[cricket] grounds, warm beer, invincible green suburbs, dog lovers and old maids
bicycling to Holy Communion through the morning mist’.
Cricket has become subject to increasing regulation at a whole host of levels. Even
within some local leagues there are complex player regulations and disciplinary
sanctions, whilst the professional game has had to contend with issues such as match-
fixing, drug taking and of course the perennial debate that concerns ‘chucking’. The
increased regulation mirrors other areas of sport and popular culture more generally:
‘In recent years the law has increasingly become involved within popular
culture on a number of different levels: the law has, in effect, begun to
colonise leisure. As the leisure industry has developed it has faced
increasing legal regulation. For example, within the music industry we see
the increased visibility of the law in contractual problems, disputes about
intellectual property and control over the dissemination of material. The
media too has been increasingly subject to legal regulation of content. The
phenomenon is equally marked within sport’.3