Rob Steen, courtesy of ESPNcricinfo, http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/857839.html
For decades this column wished it had been born ten years earlier, in 1947 rather than 1957, and thus been old enough to put flowers in its hair and claim it only didn’t go to Woodstock because of the airfare. On occasion it fantasises about being born a millennium hence, by when governments, guns, cars and disease will be extinct, sweatshops won’t be sweatshops because robots don’t sweat, and the only non-creative or non-culinary professions will be undertaking, hotel management and window-cleaning. 
Tony Cozier
Transparency at the Toss: Reforming the Protocols at Televised Cricket
Michael Roberts
At the World Cup Match between Australia and Sri Lanka at the SCG on the 8th March 2015 the designated home team captain, in this case Michael Clarke, tossed the coin by stepping away from the cluster so that the florin landed some distance away. The Match Referee, Jeff Crowe, walked over and indicated that Angelo Mathews had called wrong. So Clarke and Australia were able to bat first on what turned out to be “a gem of a batting pitch”[i] (undermining the pitch-readings of the several ‘experts’ as well as the hopes of the Sri Lankan team).
Once the match was done and dusted, however, one Sri Lankan chain-mail ‘blogger’ raised questions about the tossing result: claiming that Clarke’s move was a deliberate ploy designed to win a crucial call. Though not asserted explicitly, this outrageous allegation implied that Jeff Crowe was part of a conspiracy. Such accusations cannot be sustained. As Michael de Zoysa told me (on Skype, 7 April 2015), Jeff Crowe is a gentleman through and through, his rectitude impeccable. Continue reading →
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Filed under patriotic excess, performance, Sangakkara, Sri Lanka Cricket, technology and cricket, television commentary, World Cup 2015