Holding gets support for his ranting about the BLM movement. A few days ago, Holding had berated the English, Australian & Pakistani teams for not taking a knee during the recently concluded series. Now he seems to have found support from a couple of players. He has as well, faced opposition from another player. Hopefully, Holding will be satisfied but as I had argued previously, this is ridiculous.
Langer’s support to Holding
Langer’s comments seems that he was apologetic for not bending the knee before the series against England. He says that the Australian team must have spoken about this in much greater length and must have taken a decision. Probably to bend their knee.
In terms of the taking a knee, to be completely honest we could’ve talked more about it perhaps leading up to that first game; there was so much going on leading up to us getting here, maybe we should’ve thought and talked a bit more about it,” Langer said. “What we do talk about in the team is we want to have a response that is sustained and powerful and it can go, not just in one action, but sustained periods, not just throughout this series, throughout our summer, but throughout time.
“We’re looking at ways, I know there’s a lot of talk going on within our group about how we can, I know there’s a lot of talking going on about the Australian women’s team as well, about how we can have a sustained and powerful response to Black Lives Matter. It’s incredibly important, and I just hope and certainly from Mikey’s point of view I hope if it looked like there was a lack of respect there, that certainly wasn’t the intention of our team.
Gillespie’s support to Holding
I think it’s a nice gesture, I think it’s powerful,” Gillespie told ESPNcricinfo.
Gillespie also said “I saw Michael Holding make the comment. I think his worry is that it’s been a gesture and a very good gesture but it will get forgotten if it’s not continually out there reminding people. I’m sensing that’s what he feels, he wants to continue the story.
“I think everyone would agree that things have happened in this world, people make a gesture and then it gets forgotten. So Michael’s thoughts, and I agree with what he’s saying, is let’s keep the gesture going, let’s keep the intent and keep it at the forefront of people’s minds and then we can keep having the conversations to inspire real change. And I subscribe to that. I think he makes a good point.
These former players must realise
What these former players fail to realise is that cricket is just a game. Black Lives Matter is a political movement that is far greater than cricket can ever be. Cricket or for that matter, any sport, is not the place where political battles must be fought. There maybe situations, especially in a team that has a mixture of blacks, whites and coloured players playing together. IPL, BBL and other leagues are good examples. Some of them may not be willing to bend their knees not because they do not support such a movement but because they do not want to show the entire world that they do care. This will surely result in rifts within the team as Lungi Ngidi discovered.
This Black Lives Matter movement captured the sporting world off-guard and lot of sportspersons did bent their knees in support of such a movement. It has now become stale. There is a saying. Too many cooks spoils the broth. If Holding and these former players insist on continuing with this insane practice, they risk derailing the entire movement itself. These players have made their point and it is now time to move on. Let the political pundits take care of this. They players job is to play the game and nothing more and nothing less.
Some sane voices in the cricketing world
Luckily, not everyone of the players wants to continue with this movement on the field. There were some saner voices too. Aaron Finch and most notably from Jofra Archer. Aaron Finch went on to say that “education around it is more important than the protest”. It makes perfect sense. This is what is required. Education. If the movement is allowed to continue in every sporting game, it will only result in antagonising a lot of people making the whole movement go out of rails.
On the otherhand, Archer was extremely critical of Holding. He went onto to say that Holding does not know anything that is happening in the background. If reports are to be believed, it is true that Holding does not know anything. To borrow from George Dobbell’s article, The “background” measures referred to by Archer include the ECB setting up an Inclusion and Diversity taskforce, a commitment to increasing the representation of non-white individuals in leadership roles, a game-wide anti-discrimination charter and a bursary scheme for young black coaches, with a focus on “leadership, education and opportunity”. There will also be a further drive to reintroduce cricket in primary schools, with a focus on ethnically diverse areas.
A cricket board should not be expected to do anything more than this. This is going out of the way to please a specific community.
IPL escapes
I am sure the Indian franchise teams are heaving a sigh of relief because Holding is not in the commentary team for IPL. Otherwise, each team with their mix of players from various backgrounds, would have found themselves in a tricky spot. With the majority of the players being Indians, it would not have made sense to support the BLM movement when the problems in this country itself is on a different level.
Conclusion
I am of the firm opinion that this movement, though it is genuine and in the interest of a specific community, does not have a place in a sporting environment. I can only hope that the ICC does not make it mandatory for every player to bend their knee before the start of every game.
What do you think of support for Holding and opposition to his stand?
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