The Bob Woolmer Whodunit

Cricket is one of the few international games that, until recently, managed to retain a hint of unrehearsed chaos and inspiration that has vanished from a number of other professional sports. The reason obviously was that there wasnt enough money in this sport to attract or sustain the interest of corporate style management and performances tended to be, for better or worse, spontaneous. All of that changed when online or structured betting organizations figured out that the format of one day cricket was highly adaptable to betting. Alongwith the uninvited, there has also been some eagerly solicited interest in the game ever since Satellite TV made it possible for the vast majority of former Raj community expats to watch the games and stay in touch with what has remained a passion for many of these countries. Money has been slow to show up but it has...and the face of cricket as a "gentleman's game" has changed in consequence. First came the One Dayers and then the floodlit day and night games and the white ball with Kerry Pecker and then the colored uniforms in World Cup 1992. In recent years the South African and the Australian Teams changed their coaching strategies to closely simulate those followed by the heavy weights of sports like football and base ball. Every delivery was recorded and analyzed and this became part of the team strategy for winning. Databases were introduced to store and crunch information.

One of the pioneers of this paradigm shift was Bob Woolmer who introduced many of the techniques during his coaching tenure with the SA team that failed to snatch a world cup victory under him but still remains one of the most professional, predictable and stable teams in Cricket. Bob Woolmer was called the "computer coach" by the Australians who were the first to deal with his South African team and later the first team other than S.A. to convert to his style of coaching.

Woolmer was part of the Kerry Pecker team in the world tour (one of the most controversial teams in cricket history)and later in 1994 as a coach he had to defend his reputation when it was alleged that he encouraged ball tampering. He denied having encouraged such practices at the time but in 2006 in an official statement advocated seam lifting with fingernails, saying that it should be made legal.

When he joined the Pakistan side as a coach, it was to replace Javed Miandad. It would be hard to say with any degree of sincerity that this move was unconditionally welcomed at the time by Miandad who was kicked out after his side lost to India on home ground, by Imran who proposed Wasim Akram for the role or by Wasim who proposed Waqar Younis for the role. It was a controversial move.

In typical Bob Woolmer fashion, the Pakistani side he has coached has been lackluster in recent years even though it has improved in almost all significant areas in a slow move away from inspired personality driven cricket towards a sound, correct and principled regime.

During the months leading up to the world cup, the pakistani squad has seen its share of ups and downs but the team announced for the world cup was anything but inspiring. The leading pace attack was missing, the rest of the team suffered from an acute lack of experience and the captain was out of form. Nothing however had prepared the audience for a defeat at the hands of the Irish debutants that would cause Pakistanies to bow out of the contest. The defeat was humiliating and unexpected...two keywords that form the crux of whatever lies behind Bob Woolmer's murder.

He was found in his room late in the morning after Pakistan's unglorious defeat to Ireland with signs of vomit and blood at the scene of crime. The death was initially treated as a result of stress or a possible heartattack. Two hours after the discovery a news conference was held by the Pakistani team management to announce the news. The Pakistani captain Inzamam, unfortunately, chose the same news conference to announce his retirement from International Cricket. This, while in itself an innocent enough coincidence, held a hint as to what order of importance things held for the Pakistan captain and perhaps also the team management that were aware of his prepared speech and did not try to hold back or delay his own announcement.

The Jamaican police later decided to treat the death as suspicious and later still, it was treated as homicide and it was disclosed that the Pakistani team was to undergo genetic tests and hold individual interviews with the authorities investigating the murder. The team representitive complained that the hotel security was abysmal (a little too late for that my friend). The following morning the cause of death was disclosed as asphyxia...read strangulation. Woolmer was a big strong guy and it was speculated that it could be the work of more than one person. At the same time since there were no signs of forced entry, the speculation was that it was somebody he knew.

Whodunit then?

Given Woolmer's record of flirting with the dangerous and the controversial, is it possible that he was involved with some kind of a betting mafia and consorted with some of the players to stage a defeat that otherwise defies comprehension? And given the extreme passions that the game invokes in it's followers, is it possible that someone found out and decided to take things in their own hands? Who would the culprits be? Could it be fans of the Pakistani side? The betting mafia?...or...unthinkable as it might sound...members of the team who were not in on the fix up and decided to teach him a lesson when they found out?

The question remains unanswered until a full enquiry into the murder has been concluded. But strangulation, typically, points to crimes of passion. And the religious fervour that has been on the rise in the Pakistani team in the recent years could be just the right catalyst to give a righteous twist to unrestrained anger.

However it happened, the fact remains that cricket has changed its face and will never be the same. It would be useless to potulate theories about what exactly will follow in terms of the future of the game. One thing however is sure...publicity, good or bad, is still publicity.