Hello and welcome to Stumped, your intercontinental hit of news, views,
features, and debate from the quirky world of cricket. I'm Charu Sharma subbing this week for
Alison Mitchell and I'm in Mumbai because of a bereavement in the family. I had to rush here.
But you know there's always time for our favourite cricket show. Also, that reminds me last week,
and perhaps I should have mentioned that on last week's Stumped, we had the passing away of Salim Durani,
my biggest and earliest cricketing hero here in India. Because of the IPL times,
a quick reminder that maybe 60 years ago or so, if there was T20 cricket, he would have easily been its biggest hero.
Nice to see you Charu in the big chair this week. Hello to you. Brett Sprigg here
at the ABC in Sydney, where it must be said, not a lot happening in cricket locally, but I've spoken
to the man you usually see here, Jim Maxwell. He's visiting Normandy, which is obviously a sobering
testament to the sacrifice of so many young men, June 6th being the key date there D-Day. When
I flash forward to June 6th this year, no doubt there will be an anniversary memorial observance
on that date. On a much lighter note, it'll also be the day before the World Test Championship at
the Oval. Australia versus India as a nice entrée leading into the Ashes. So, it's exciting and it's
now only seven weeks away. Hi guys. I'm Nikesh Rughani. It's great to be here. Charu, Brett,
thanks for having me on. I'm in Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It's pretty
sunny here today. The cricket season, the County Championship got under way last week.
We've had the usual rains in April to greet the start of the cricket season. Thankfully,
it's sunny today and we're ready for another round of County Championship action. I've also been
keeping an eye on the IPL, being a commentator for the BBC's coverage on the radio as well. So,
lots going on in the cricket world here in the UK and happy to be on with you guys.
Yes, Nikesh, welcome to the show, especially and of course, about that a commentary on IPL, we'll be talking
to you a little later on. But first on the show, we are joined by a history maker - it doesn't
happen very often. But, of course, we often on Stumped talk about international cricket stars
or coaches who are paving the way for the next generation of stars. But today, we're joined by an
umpire who is doing just that. Kim Cotton from New Zealand has become the first female on-field
umpire to stand in a men's international, but not just that, it's between two full-member nations.
A very warm welcome to you, Kim. Thanks for joining us. Thank you, it's a pleasure to be here.
I just think umpiring a tough job, but you obviously liked it? Yeah, definitely. I mean,
it's the closest you can get to actually playing the game without playing the game.
I've spoken to commentators; I think they've got the best spot sitting up there watching,
they've got replays so they can look at things a couple times. But no, I'm right out there in
the middle and I get to see it all. If I'm doing my job properly, not impacting on the game, so
yeah, I just loved it. Obviously, we all have to have a bit of a go at scoring as well when you do
your club cricket, but that didn't interest me as much as it does the umpiring did. So,
yeah, just enjoying it. Every season there seems to be something new, something exciting. It just
keeps the interest there and keeps me going. As Charu mentioned, that piece of history that you
got to be a part of Kim, or that you achieved: New Zealand versus Sri Lanka. How was that moment? How
did that feel because umpires can't show too much emotion. You're aware that's something that's a
pretty special piece of history, but how did it feel, that moment, that day for you?
At the end of the game, it was a relief to get through the game and have a good game. But building up to it,
obviously I was nervous. Yeah, and a lot of people came up to me and say 'congratulations, well done.
Have a good game. You deserve this,' so it's helpful having that support building up to it. I
don't know whether it's fully sunk in yet. For me, it's another game. It was another step up, another
challenge. As I said, I was extremely nervous because even though I've umpired most of the
Black Caps at domestic cricket or club cricket and I know them, it's still another level.
It's more scrutiny. It's just that little bit more difficult.
Yeah, really honoured to be able to have that opportunity and hopefully more to come, but really
pleased with how my game went that day. We talk about paving the way and I know here in Australia,
we've got Eloise Sheridan and Claire Polosak to name a couple that are always on the fringes of
achieving what you have and they're great umpires. Why's that representation, do you think, important in cricket?
I think it's just so that anybody else was thinking of playing cricket, umpiring cricket,
any sort of involvement in cricket, they can see that there are females. You don't have to be
male to be involved and it's a game that there's different aspects.
Everyone can be involved, but I don't know that I'm paving the way, as such.
I'm just one person out there umpiring, doing my thing and if that inspires others, fantastic.
Kim, you mentioned that interesting comparison between commentators and umpires and
us commentators thinking we have got the best job in the world. One thing we definitely don't
get to do is walk onto the field during a World Cup Final. You obviously did that in the women's
T20 World Cup in 2022. What is it like to step out onto the field on such a big occasion like that?
Do you feel the same nerves, do you think, as some of the players might feel going out there?
Pretty sure that there's nerves like everybody that has to step out there on those big occasions.
There's a lot of atmosphere around, there's a lot of noise, a lot of music,
there the anthems and there's a lot that builds up the occasion. There's definitely nerves there.
I've done a couple of World Cups now. So my very first one, that was the one that I was the most
nervous for it. I still get nervous before World Cups because I always want to do well.
And that's not quite the same as the first one because that was quite an amazing event
and the MCG back in 2020 had 76,000 people and Katy Perry doing the warmup before there. That's
something pretty amazing. So, yeah, I think everybody was nervous for that game.
Kim, I must confess that as a commentator, I find it difficult to listen to matches,
re-runs of matches I've commentated on because one feels I could have always said this or said that
somehow make it a little better. What about you? Do you watch re-runs of matches you've umpired?
And maybe to just assess your own performance? The short answer is yes, I do. You know, because
there's more than just the out/not out decisions. There's also the wides and judging that short
balls and things like that. There's more to it. I might make a decision and I just think that's what
I saw, particularly if it's not got DRS that can be reviewed, I might go and watch it later and see
how it looked from the TV angle and 'yeah, that was that was right. That is good.' Going back to that
first World Cup that I stood in, I don't remember a lot of that game and I actually watched it
cos we had lock down after that. I actually watched it during lock down and going 'did I signal
wide there? Yes I did, oh that's good.' And, 'oh, did I signal... yes, I did.' There were just things
that I'd forgotten in the moment of just so much going on and I'd forgotten a lot of things. So,
I do like to go back and review things and see if there's anything I can do to be better.
You're being very humble in the past about paving the way. Kim, we think you are paving the way and you
have made history. Thanks so much for joining us on Stumped. Thank you for inviting me on.
And now on to the Indian Premier League and Nikesh, I know that you've been doing commentary for a few of the
matches on BBC. It's still early stages, but how do you think this year's tournament is brewing?
Well, as always Charu with the start of the IPL, there's always so much hype, so much excitement.
Not just in India, but from T20 cricket fans all around the world. Lots of English interest,
so me being based in England, you can really feel that sense of extra interest in the last
few years, especially this year with the likes of Ben Stokes out there. Jos Butler always does well.
It's great to see, I think first and foremost, that the IPL is back on the road. We have got
proper home and away matches. The games have been good, the games have been pretty tight.
There's not been much in it for the bowlers, early on, we've got to say, in this tournament.
But look, we've seen lots of runs and the crowd seem pretty happy with the way things have gone
so far and some great individual performances as well. How do Australians take the IPL? I know
there's a time differential which is a bit of a problem, but is it creating as much interest as
I presume it is in England and other parts of the world? What's pleasing is that for the past couple
of years, it's been back on accessible television here. It's still paid television, but for most
cricket fans that he's not a worry and they get to follow how the Aussies are doing. I almost think
the WPL garnered more fanfare this time around because the Australians featured prominently in
the first iteration of that competition. But as far as those broader discussion points go,
David Warner is a fascinating one. He's obviously scoring runs, but not quickly enough for the
Delhi Capitals and there's this continued discussion about his future at international
level as well. Our best bowler has been Nathan Ellis, the right arm quick who has only played
a handful of international matches. He is fast proving himself as a world class T20 performer.
He had that spell of 4-fer last week, which proved match winning. He's at Punjab Kings isn't he?
But again, I wonder whether this sort of thing, this exposure in the IPL counts for much when it
comes to those future prospects down the line, being a regular player for Australia in Nathan
Ellis case. The other two fascinating ones are also Maxwell and Stoinis, who were under pressure
to hold their spots in their respective teams and then appear to have righted that ship a little bit
in the past few days. But look, it's fun. We have a reasonably full strength Australian contingent
back in the IPL this year and there's still a lot of cricket to be played.
It is attracting a different kind of attention, but I must quickly mention that I saw something in the Sydney Herald,
which really surprised me. Somebody I know well, I met him in India in the past - Neil Maxwell - one
of Australia's most influential player agents, manages Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood amongst
others, said the next phase of "the IPL revolution could have players asking for permission from
their Indian owners to represent Australia and not the other way round!" Your thoughts?
Yes. And this is something we've alluded to before on this programme. With the onset of those Indian
conglomerates owning multiple teams across multiple countries, you might, for example,
have a contract with the Mumbai Indians that means you're playing not only in India, but for their
affiliate teams in South Africa, the UAE, New York would be nice. And how the mechanism works
on the world stage. It sounds fanciful, but as we see in sports like football and basketball, it's
commonplace that players have to get clearance from their teams to play for their nation. They
are assets worth millions of dollars to put it that way. So who's going to pay the insurance?
It's quite easy, in fact, to see this happening, come to think of it for better or worse as players
seek flexibility across the format. I don't know Charu, what do you think?
Well there is the slim possibility at this point of time because the cricket leagues are not long enough. You mention
basketball players and of course English football players and many other such leagues, but that's
a situation where the players are contracted to a franchise virtually through the year for a league
that's eight to nine months or so. In cricket for the moment, most of the leagues are very short.
The IPL being perhaps the longest at over two months or about two months. So, I don't quite
see that happening right now. But you mentioned an important point, because the Indian franchise
owners or other franchise owners own teams in many leagues around the country. So, cumulatively, a
good T20 player could be very busy. I still think that cricket, I don't know, I'll give it a time.
Fifteen years. From any such thing happening. Maybe Neil Maxwell of course sees the future a
lot better than I do. But for the moment, I think that's a little far-fetched, because players will
have the ultimate right to say I want to play for my country. I will. Because in cricket, playing
for your country, because there's so much of it when you play for your country. There's so many,
tours between countries. There are so many of them that that too is lucrative, so it's
not just T20 or these franchise leagues that these players can play.
Interesting point there Charu. We are getting into a situation though where there is so much money involved in the IPL.
There's so much interest in that competition and there's interest from various billionaires,
millionaires, whatever you might call them. Not just from India, but from other countries,
in buying these franchises. They are proper cash cow for all the people involved. And
are they going to then expand it to 12 teams, to 14 teams, are we going to get to 20
teams at some stage? Something similar to the English Premier League when it comes to football.
And if you have a 20-team league, are you going to need to play over six months? Perhaps.
So I don't think we're as far off that kind of situation as maybe 15 years.
That's my own personal opinion. When it comes to international tours as well,
are we going to see the World Test Championship continue in 10-15 years time? Probably
not. South Africa don't seem particularly interested in playing Test cricket at the
moment. You've got other countries like the West Indies, whose players pick and choose
when they are available for the national team in white-ball cricket. And in red-ball cricket,
the teams are completely different. Sri Lanka - there's other countries who just make no money.
It costs them so much to stage Test matches. Are we just getting away from this where maybe just
India, Australia and England play Test cricket and everybody else kind of frees themselves up?
Well you share my thoughts on Test match cricket because very often on Stumped and elsewhere I have
said that that's the one in big trouble. So we ll see about the World Test Championship. But
I still do believe that the one thing that will keep cricket away from the situation that Neil
Maxwell and others talk about now is the fact that only the IPL seems to have got an official window,
a clear window from the ICC. But let's get back to the IPL and some unbelievable matches. Nikesh of
course, you've been involved and Brett I wonder if you've been watching them. There's a two percent
chance in my own little kitchen statistics of chasing 200, yet, it seems almost the norm
now. The more that we see T20 cricket, the more these top players are exposed to it. And it's been
going since 2003 now. There's been a long time for players to get used to not just the conditions,
but there's innovation in terms of how to bat. And if you need 12-15 an over off the last
four or five overs. You would back yourselves nine times out of ten if you've got wickets in hand and
if you've got batters in form at the crease. So the game has changed, the game has evolved so
much in the last few years. We don't always see these scores chased down. I mean, Rinku Singh,
that was something really special. Rahul Tewatia did something similar a few years ago when he was
playing for the Rajasthan Royals. It wasn't five sixes in a row, but it was five sixes in the over
to win a match for the Rajasthan Royals. So that's the only ever time I've seen something similar to
that. So we have seen some really special things to chase down, these scores of 200 plus.
Nicholas Pooran you mentioned there as well. I'd much rather go and see a 400 run game
than a 140 plays a 135. That's just me. You'll make some good friends with bowlers for sure!
You can tell I was a batter right? And yet for all the freakish individual brilliance you mentioned
Nikesh, it does seem like a natural evolution of the game that we just get these higher and
higher scores. I remember thinking back years ago in a One Day International, scoring 300 was the
marker. And now, one team scored 400 and then it happened twice in one game and now it's happened
20 times, and using the marker again Charu as far as how much the game has shifted so much since
then. And perhaps due to the advent of T20 cricket and the influence has had on the longer formats
as well. But it is a natural evolution isn't it, that all of a sudden what we thought was a good
score is going to become par and then sub-par and it's just going to keep climbing.
Well, that's all we've got time for on Stumped. My thanks to Brett Sprigg and Nikesh Rughani particularly for joining
us this week and to all of you for listening. Thank you all and we'll speak to you again soon.