Former Australian cricketers on Andrew Symonds alleging that he was subjected to racist chants during the one-day series in India.
Mark Waugh said just making monkey noises did not amount to racism.
"What is Andrew Symonds complaining about – monkey noises?" Waugh said on Fox Sports' Inside Cricket.
"Does that come down to racism, without actually saying any words? I don't know."
Waugh said such taunts were part of the game.
Former captain Allan Border also seems to be taking the same tack. He agreed that the crowds always tried to irritate the visiting side.
"There have always been taunts from crowds, from as long as I can remember," Border said.
Now we can understand why Ponting and Brett Lee are making conciliatory noises.
8 comments:
The whole thing appears to be a beat-up to me. Racism should not be part of the game, but it is almost impossible to control what the crowd at large does. Whether the 'monkey noises' constitutes racism is one thing, but what concerns me more is the fact that as India have seemed to condone this, the Australia crowds will retaliate. And that will be both unfortunate and potentially nasty.
I agree.
Curious to know, how people in Australia, as we say the third person, views this ruckus.
i think it's the indian players, especially the senior ones who have been ambling along at a self-preserving run rate, that the indian crowds should be making monkey noises at.
Absolutely. In fact I devoutly wish they make all noises emanating from the barnyard, namely, cat-calls and boos.
Unfortunately, the seniors self preservation instinct will come into play tomorrow.
You can see them diving, scampering and what not.
My problem with the whole thing is by the end of the tour they didnt make their chants deeper, more like gorrillas. As they weren't beaten by a monkey, they were squashed by a gorilla.
Uncle j rod,
Maybe it could be something to do with their limited abilities.
I understand from the experts that it is difficult to mimic a gorilla.
BTW, are you refering to you know who? :)
To be able to call something racist, you need to know the exact words they pouted.
Is Roy going to open up to it?
And fgs, someone tell me what's a monkey chant? Like, did they call him a monkey? Is that somehow related to his race? What if they called him an, er, elephant?
SixandOut,
I am as puzzled. For the life of me I can’t imagine a Vadodra crowd chanting in English.
Likewise I can’t imagine the great unwashed public of Mumbai chanting anything other than in their native tongue when they turn hmm…. emotional.
Dare say, Symonds, must have taken a crash course.
I forgot who, but someone responded to the same question in another blog by saying that Brett Lee translated and sung it to Symonds as a single. Since he can’t ask Lee to shut up he transferred his anger to the crowd and so it goes and so it goes.
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