Cricket Australia (CA) will mount a television advertising campaign, and may place anti-racism messages on the bottom of beer cups, in an effort to avoid racist crowd behavior during tours by India and Sri Lanka this season.
CA chief executive James Sutherland said yesterday he was confident there would be no crowd behavior issues during the Australian summer, despite recent tension between Australian and Indian players and the presence in the Sri Lankan team of Muttiah Muralitharan, who has previously been taunted by Australian crowds.
"We don't need to go any further than we went last year in terms of educating the public about coming to the cricket and enjoying themselves," Sutherland said.
"I'm not concerned about [racist abuse]," he added. "We had a major campaign last year to increase awareness and understanding. People know where the line is drawn."
"There is no place for racism in cricket. We will take the strictest, harshest action possible if there are incidents," Sunderland said.
Muralitharan will arrive in Australia for next month's Test series chasing the nine Test wickets he needs to overtake the world-record wicket haul of retired Australian legspinner Shane Warne.
Sutherland welcomed the Muralitharan's decision to take part in Test and one-day series in Australia, after his previously cool reception from local crowds.
"Murali is clearly able to make his own decisions," he said. "He has been to Australia before. The mere fact that he is coming is fantastic for cricket and we are very much looking forward to seeing him on our shores and doing his best."
Australia opening batsman Matthew Hayden also welcomed Muralitharan's decision to tour.
"I think it is great he is happy and feels he has matured as a cricketer to come out here but he understands that he is not coming out for a holiday. It's serious cricket," Hayden said.
"But by the same token our administration has made it very clear that there is no racial vilification of any kind that's acceptable amongst our multicultural society in our venues," he said.
Concerns have recently been expressed that India will be taunted by crowds.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier