Naive Smith was lost in charge of that team
THAT’S THE DAMNING VERDICT OF ENGLISHMAN IAN GOULD, THE UMPIRE AT THE CENTRE OF AUSSIE CHEATING SCANDAL
‘Umpires were against DRS... now they take it on the chin’
Ian Gould has just been walking on the seafront at Hove. It is eerie; empty. When he retired as an international umpire after 13 years following last summer’s World Cup, Gould often did not know what to do with himself. Retirement in a country in lockdown is something else.
‘Retiring crucified me,’ he said. ‘at the weekend when there was no football on, my wife said, “You look lost”. I am lost, just like so many other people.’
He spent the winter writing his memoirs, which shine a brilliant light into the hidden world of an international umpire. It is called
Gunner, his nickname after a spell at arsenal as a teenager.
He did not make it as a goalkeeper at Highbury but as a cricketer he played for England in the 1983 World Cup. at breakfast one morning, Gould, wearing a lightblue blazer, was asked by Peter May who he was and which Cambridge college he attended.
Gould was England’s wicketkeeper and had gone to Westgate Secondary Modern in Slough. This might have been funny if May had not been chairman of selectors at the time.
Two years ago, Gould found himself at the centre of the cricket world. He was the third umpire in the third Test between South africa and australia at Cape Town when the director overseeing the television coverage called him. ‘ Gunner, we have got something you and the other outfield umpires need to look at.’
It was footage of australia’s opening batsman Cameron Bancroft applying ‘something yellow’ to the ball. The something yellow turned out to be sandpaper, and, as Gould remarked, ‘ the world just stopped’.
The fallout was spectacular. australia’s captain, Steve Smith, and his deputy, david Warner, were banned for a year. Bancroft, who at least had the grace to apologise to the umpires, was banned for nine months. darren lehmann resigned as coach.
‘Steve Smith is a good bloke, a charming guy, slightly naive,’ said Gould. ‘He was the sort who would sit at the back of the dressing room and never raise his voice. He was lost in charge of that team.
‘ I read a brilliant article by Ricky Ponting, who said he had carried on as captain for two or three years too long because he didn’t see anyone capable of taking over from him. If it had been Ponting or Steve Waugh in charge, it would never have got to that stage.’
You might have thought that the sheer scale of the scandal would have put a halt to ball tampering, at least in the short term. However, Gould’s very next assignment was to umpire Sri lanka’s tour of the West Indies and it started up again, albeit with methods less blatant than sandpaper. ‘If you find a friendly cameraman, you will catch them,’ he said. ‘If you don’t, you have very little chance.’
The pressure on an international umpire is relentless. Gould would commentate to himself during a game to
keep his focus. The first thing he would do when he entered a hotel room was to disconnect the phone in case a bookmaker called. on the pitch every decision would be subject to a review on dRS.
‘When you come back to the room you can stare into the mirror for five minutes and ask yourself: “Why did you do that?”,’ he said. ‘one of my first series as an umpire was one of the biggest there is — India v Pakistan. almost the first call I received was from a bookmaker. I was so naive.
‘When I mentioned it to the other officials, they looked me in the eye and you could see they were thinking: “Who is this guy? He has been here a day and he’s already got a bookmaker on his case.”
‘The standard of umpiring in international cricket is the highest it has ever been. When dRS came in, the senior umpires were dead against it because they thought it would expose them. now they tend to take the reviews on the chin. I would not have said that nine years ago.
‘ There was one review at Melbourne when I was convinced the batsman had missed it by 18 inches. They all went up. It was reviewed. I said to the non-striker, david Warner: “If that is out, I am finished.” The replays showed it missing by 18 inches.’
as a former footballer, Gould sees a clear distinction between dRS and VaR. ‘In cricket it seems natural. a couple of years ago, I was at a Test match as a spectator. There was a review, I put my pint down and watched it and it all seemed part of the flow. In football it doesn’t seem natural and that’s why it’s disliked.
‘I don’t know Paul Tierney but when he went over to check the pitchside monitor (during a game between Bournemouth and norwich in January), he did every Premier league referee a favour.
‘He deserves a pat on the back but I am sure he got an absolute rollicking.’
Gould is what you would expect most wicketkeepers to be: bubbly, chatty, opinionated. However, there is a cruelty to cricket, where a career can be decided by one edge, one lbw. as a teenager, Gould found the Middlesex dressing room far nastier and more intimidating than the one he had left behind at arsenal. Cricket is a sport with an unusually high incidence of depression.
one day, after returning from new Zealand, Gould walked into the kitchen and placed his passport carefully in the fridge. His son watched him do it.
His elder brother, Barrie, had died. Ian was drinking too much. He enjoyed travelling but he was spending only around 80 days a year at home. He was burnt out. Something had to give.
Eventually, he sought out denis Burns, a club cricketer from Salford who is now an international umpiring coach.
‘I blurted out 18 months of anger and fear while he smoked his cigarettes and listened to every word.
‘after a while I decided I wanted to go back on the circuit. Putting my passport in the fridge between the cheese and the ham became a defining moment of my life.’