AHMADABAD (AP):
THE WEST Indies had set a bad precedent for cricket by blowing a "minor incident out of proportion" and staging a walkout at Rajkot, an Indian cricket official said yesterday.
"The West Indies walkout of the Rajkot one-dayer on Tuesday could become one of cricket's major headaches in times to come," said Niranjan Shah, a former secretary of the Indian cricket board.
Objects thrown onto the grounds from the spectator stands in three successive limited-overs internationals prompted the West Indies team to walk off the field after a plastic bottle hit fielder Vasbert Drakes.
International Cricket Council match referee Mike Proctor allowed the Windies to take their players off the field in Rajkot, although he later awarded the match to India under a formula for shortened games.
"The West Indies over reacted to what's an occupational hazard for players all over the world," said Shah, chief of the organising body at Rajkot.
"With a minor incident being blown out of proportion, cricket will play into the hands of trouble-mongers, who have realised that they just need to hurl one bottle into the playing arena to sabotage a match," he said.
Shah said it could create an international precedent.
"If a stray bottle thrown at a player can lead to the game being aborted, it can now happen anywhere in the world," Shah said. Crowds sensing their team was in a losing position could spark trouble to void the result.
"There was just one mischief monger out to create some trouble and the West Indies helped him by making a mountain out of a molehill," Shah said.
West Indies team manager Ricky Skerrit contested Shah's view, saying what's been happening during the series were not minor incidents.
"Ramnaresh Sarwan was hit by a stone on the back during the second one-dayer in Nagpur and then Drakes got hit by a water bottle filled with water and dirt ... You call these minor incidents," Skerrit said.
"We prefer a cricket decision to take place on the field and have focused on cricket even when objects were thrown at our players," he said. "But in this case our players had genuine cause to believe they faced bodily harm."
Shah said he did not agree with the match referee and the West Indies team taking 'an accumulated view of three matches.'
"What happened in the other two venues of the current series cannot be related to Rajkot," he said.
But Skerrit said the West Indies didn't have 'preconceived notions about security.'
"We go into every match thinking security is not a problem, until the situation erupts otherwise," said Skerrit.
Former Indian captain Ravi Shastri, who was present as a television commentator at the disrupted match, said the incident was overplayed and the water bottle 'was not dangerous.'
"There was no further threat to compel play being called off. I suspect that the experience of the previous two games would have weighed on the mind of the match referee," Shastri said in his newspaper column.
"Crowd trouble is becoming endemic in India. Unless the authorities move in swiftly, there is only going to be more trouble in future," he said.
