Sad day for Cricket fans. RIP Phil Hughes

27th November 2014 will forever be remembered as a day to commemorate Phillip Hughes.

This has come as an absolute shock to all the Cricket fans. The incident itself was shocking. But even after that, I felt Phil Hughes will be fine. The recovery may take time, maybe years, but he will be fine. That’s how it normally happens right? Death from a cricketing incident is rare. There have been a total of 5-6 reported incidents of death due to an accident that happened on a Cricket field. And Cricket has been played for more than a century now. But whenever such an accident happens, it comes as an absolute shock. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family and closed ones.

Spare a thought for the Bowler, Sean Abbot. He’s as much a victim as the family of Phil Hughes. He will, unfortunately, have to live with the guilt for the rest of his life! I can’t even fathom what he might be going through. It’s a freak accident and it was his delivery that, unintentionally, did the damage. 

Our immediate anger may be diverted towards the Helmet manufacturers. Are they responsible? They claim Phil Hughes was wearing a helmet designed in 2013 and it was upgraded in 2014 with additional protection behind. They also claim if Hughes was wearing the new helmet, the damage could have been controlled. If what they claim is correct, then who allowed Hughes to wear an old helmet? The finger pointing may go on. In such a case, I don’t think anyone is responsible (not directly, at least).

But the buck surely stops with ICC – the “custodians” of the game of Cricket. They are responsible for maintaining the game to its highest standards – be it sanctity, ethics, conduct or safety of players. ICC needs to hold the bull by its horns and take urgent action to improve the safety of their players. Helmets, guards and other protective gears should be of the highest possible quality and should do exactly what it’s supposed to do – protect. These should also be reviewed for safety standards periodically and newer technologies that are proven to be better than what is being used today should be immediately adopted irrespective of the cost involved. This incident should be a wake-up call for the ICC to ensure the fans experience Cricket sans any casualty. 

There are murmurs that bouncers should be banned from the game as its deemed dangerous. That’s downright foolish. It’s like asking Batsmen not to play the straight drive because an umpire stands in the way and the shot may injure him! 

To be fair to the game, despite what happened today, I don’t think Cricket is a dangerous sport. Yes, there are incidents that happen on the pitch that can injure a player, career-ending sometimes. But death is a rarity. Cricket has moved from a generation where batsmen never used to wear helmets while facing fast bowlers (Sunil Gavaskar, for example) to high quality and technologically advanced forms of protective gears. Phil Hughes’ death is a stark reminder that ICC cannot rest on the current levels of safety and should be one step ahead to avoid even the rarest of rare accidents.

Today is truly a sad day in the life of a Cricket fan. Hope not to see such a day ever.