Domestic Umpire targets promising batsman!

[Don]

Shashank Ranade Targets Manoj Tiwary... From CricketNext... Mumbai:Manoj Tiwari has been struggling for form, but against a particular umpire who seems ever keen to raise the finger at the slightest of appeals against the Bengal batsman. When Manoj Tiwary walked in to bat against Uttar Pradesh, with Bengal's score line reading 41-2, he had a dual task at hand. He had to stall Praveen Kumar and S Tyagi from making further dents in Bengal's fragile middle-order. Second, he had to make this innings count for himself. Chairman of selectors Dilip Vengsarkar was expected to watch this game in order to assess the present form of both Tiwary and Suresh Raina for the selection of the One-Day team for the triangular series in Australia. What a star-crossed day it was for Bengal and Tiwary. Bengal were skittled out for 149, and yet again Manoj perished to a dubious leg-before decision – the ball clearly deviating off his inside edge. While this is a common pattern in international cricket, let alone Indian cricket, there is a story here. The decision came from none other than umpire Shashank Ranade. In an earlier piece, Cricketnext reported how Ranade had become a nemesis to Tiwary. In a recent one-day match between India A and South Africa 'A' at Rajkot, he raised the dreaded finger after the ball lobbed in the air after crashing Manoj's helmet. In fact, Ranade has been truly consistent on this score: last season in a Ranji Trophy Super League match between Hyderabad and Bengal, he declared Tiwary leg-before when the deflection was as clear as it could be. "Can't see, can't hear," groaned a Bengal player. "He has something against us. No matter what grade we give him, we know our cricket board will allow him to keep coming at us in the big games." A senior board official told Cricketnext, "Changes can only come to effect after we finish the Elite Group matches. We have no choice but to continue with the earlier panel. We have been screening their performance this season. Players could be rest assured that next year we will sift out the dross." The official informed that Ranade earned high ratings in the past. It's not surprising; trend in the last two years indicates that favourable decisions largely influence a winning captain's assessment of the umpire. Another official griped that the Indian media seldom reports umpires' showing in domestic cricket, and instead trains its focus on issues like "the Board President's meeting with the chairman of selectors to settle a compensation package." For Tiwary the plight continues. He started the season with a double-century against Hyderabad but seems to be losing out on the sweepstakes after two failures in the last game against Orissa, which Bengal lost convincingly. What is more, Bengal face the threat of relegation should they concede an outright win to Uttar Pradesh. With the cream of the team defecting to the Indian Cricket League, Bengal had to usher in massive changes. Deplorably, apart from Arindam Das and Wriddhiman Saha, none of the rest look the part. Remains to be seen whether the Cricket Association of Bengal is swift enough to react to Ranade and the dark dungeon in which the Bengal team finds itself at the moment.

[Don]

this is freaking sick, no wonder there is no representation of India at Elite leval of umpiring. How can any one have such low morals to target a promising batsman?

[Guest BossBhai]

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[Tapioca]

The first thing to do is to ascertain if there is any substance in it. The easiest excuse for a batsman to explain his failure is to blame it on the umpire. Plus, none of our websites and other media have a weakness for truth.

[Sachinism]

heard about this what an *******

[sandtest]

Guess, Cricketnext is an IBN site, so once again their criticism will be limited to anything India and Indians.

[Mr. Wicket]

The first thing to do is to ascertain if there is any substance in it. The easiest excuse for a batsman to explain his failure is to blame it on the umpire. Plus' date=' none of our websites and other media have a weakness for truth.[/quote'] And this comes from Sanjay Jha's cricketnext of all places, which is like expecting breaking news and cutting edge insights from supermarket tabloids... BTW, also worth keeping in mind that Jha (the site's main editor when I last checked) has a ridiculously pro-Bengali/pro-Ganguly stance, and is strongly anti Chappell/anything else that's on the wrong side of a Bengali. So with a piece like this whinging about the umpiring v. Bengal and their best batsman in particular, keep that in mind.