Fletcher brands Hair treatment 'unfair'

Reuters

UNFAIR: Former England cricket coach Duncan Fletcher has branded Australian umpire Darrell Hair's treatment after last year's infamous Oval Test match as unfair.

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Former England cricket coach Duncan Fletcher has branded Australian umpire Darrell Hair's treatment after last year's infamous Oval Test match as unfair.

Fletcher said in his autobiography Hair's fellow umpire, Billy Doctrove, supported a five-run penalty against Pakistan for suspected ball tampering and the awarding of the match to England after the visitors' sit-in protest.

"Doctrove backed him to the hilt but it was Hair who copped all the flak," Fletcher said in a Daily Mail serialisation of his book, Behind the Shades.

"That was unfair and doubtless it will mean that from now on umpires will not want to make the big decisions.

"That is not good for the game."

The International Cricket Council (ICC) sacked Hair from top-level matches in the aftermath of the fourth day of the fourth Test at The Oval.

Hair recently dropped a racial discrimination case against the ICC in a London employment tribunal in return for the sport's governing body agreeing to consider re-appointing him next March.

Fletcher also said he was concerned about the possibility of ball tampering when the ball was reverse swinging early in the England innings.

He asked to examine the ball before play on the fourth morning, but Hair refused.

"I went out to begin the warm-ups," Fletcher recalled.

"Hair then approached me.

"`I'm not going to show you the ball, he said bluntly, but we've got a handle on it and are monitoring the situation'."

The Pakistan team were subsequently cleared of ball tampering.

- AAP