Former England skipper and ICC match referee Mike Denness, who accused maestro of ball tampering, dies of cancer.
Mike Denness, the man who accused Sachin Tendulkar of ball tampering and dared to impose a suspended ban on the maestro, died of cancer on Friday. He was 72.
A fine batsman who played the cover drive as beautifully as any great, Denness was the only Scotsman to have captained England. He played 28 Tests (1969-1975) and 501 first-class matches (1959-1980) for Kent and Essex. A man of integrity, he even dropped himself from an Ashes Test (Sydney, 1974-75) because he wasn’t doing well against pace twins Dennis Lillee and Jeff Thomson.
Denness, however, was hated in this part of the world for what he did in his capacity as ICC match referee during the second Test between India and South Africa at Port Elizabeth in 2001-02.
Denness pulled up Tendulkar for “ball tampering” and five other Indians, including captain Sourav Ganguly, for reasons ranging from “excessive appealing” to “not upholding the spirit of the game”.
Tendulkar, who bowled four overs on Day Three of the Test, swung the ball more than any other bowler. And when the camera panned in on him, he was spotted working on the seam of the ball with the thumb and forefinger of his left hand. Denness asked for a copy of the recording and ruled that Tendulkar had committed an unholy act.
The next day, he informed India he would be banning Tendulkar for one match, suspended for a year, for his actions. Ganguly was to be given a similar punishment for not controlling his team.
Virender Sehwag was to be banned from the third and final Test for claiming a catch off Jacques Kallis that had clearly bounced and for attempting to intimidate the umpire by charging at him, as well as using “crude or abusive language”. Batsman SS Das, wicketkeeper Deep Dasgupta and spinner Harbhajan Singh were to be handed suspended one-Test bans for excessive appealing.
All six were also fined 75% of their match fees.
After announcing his decision, Denness appeared at a press conference but did not utter a word, prompting Ravi Shastri to retort, “If Mike Denness cannot answer questions, why is he here? We know what he looks like.”
Denness’s decisions enraged the Indian team and the fans back home. So much so that the matter was raised in Parliament. BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya then demanded that Denness be removed for the third Test. The ICC stood by its man but the South African board had Denness replaced with Denis Lindsay. The ICC, in turn, refused to accord the match official status. And therefore, the third Test in Centurion was reduced to a five-day ‘friendly’ contest.
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