Cricinfo - Blogs - Rob's Lobs - Both v Chappelli (Part 31)

Chappell’s recollection, on the other hand, is that the “punch” was a “push” and that the barney had started a few days earlier. By the time he arrived at the “MCG” (the bar), he related in Ashley Mallett’s 2005 biography of his erstwhile Test skipper, Hitting Out, Botham “had obviously had a few beers and he was having a lot to say in a very loud voice. He made a couple of comments. I can’t remember exactly what they were saying but [he] said something about an Australian player and I said: ‘Yeah, you’re a typical county player. You’re the sort of player who thinks that if an Australian hasn’t been to England and played county cricket he can’t play. You think the only guy who can play in the Australian side is Greg Chappell because he played two years for Somerset.’ And he responded, ‘That’s right.’ Whereupon things “degenerated” and Botham eventually threatened to “cut” Chappell “from ear to ear”. Botham vehemently denies he used a bottle to illustrate his point.

As someone acutely aware of his own ability to make, break or inflate myths, Botham’s renditions have changed down the years. In Dudley Doust’s 1980 biography, Ian Botham – The Great All-Rounder, the Sunday Times sportswriter stated that his subject’s pursuit of Chappell ended when he “lost his prey in the traffic”. Come 1994’s blockbusting Botham – My Autobiography (Don’t Tell Kath), it was a passing police car that foreshortened the chase. Amazing how the memory improves with time.

For his part, Chappell insists he was not pursued into the car park but the main road, that the Victoria fast bowler Ian Callen grabbed Botham from behind and suggested the Somerset tyro calm down, and that he, Chappell, then withdrew. Whatever the truth, Chappell appears to have held the firmer grudge.

The way Mallett tells it, when the two Ians, by now fellow commentators, were interviewed on Channel 9 in Australia a decade or two later, “the bad blood between them was obvious”. Recalled Chappell: “At the end of it, I’ll never forget, Ray [Martin] said to Botham, ‘Oh well, you’ll still have a drink at the end of a day’s play.’

“And Botham said, ‘Yeah, that’s cricket, mate. You sit down and have a beer, or wine.’

“Ray turned to me and said, ‘You’ll be having a drink with him after the commentary is over?’

“I said, ‘No, Ray. I can find plenty of decent people to have a drink with. I won’t be drinking with him.”

Storm in a dusty old teacup? Much ado about nowt? Sure, it’s a pity two such admirable cricketers continue to lower themselves by perpetuating something that should have been forgiven and forgotten long ago. On the other hand, this is a grave time in our planet’s history. An age where, courtesy of the expansion of the media, the ability of gossip to spread at the speed of light and the evolution of litigation, the number of durable and entertaining feuds feels perilously close to an all-time low. (Oh my Oasis and my Blur of not all that long ago.) The giggles, therefore, are not unwelcome.

I've always been taught (and played) that whatever happens on the field stays on the field. But this didn't happen on the field. So whilst it may be a bit confusing or petty to people younger than 30 something, I must credit Ian Botham with sticking to his guns.

I've behaved in a similar way to others who have mocked, berated or mistreated friends or family in a public environment. And until those people apoligise for the slights and insults then they will not be forgiven. Something about not urinating if they're on fire? Like Botham I stand by my friends and family, whoever has a go at them.

This doesn't invalidate anything either of them says in their commentary or analysis (Chappelli is very often a good listen, who else has said "b*ll*cks" in a Cricinfo podcast?").

So two people don't get on? Life's like that - there are people you wouldn't lift a finger to help because of things they have said or done. The idea that everyone gets on and smiles like a happy little Moonie is an idealist thing, and life ain't idealist.

In a scrap I'd back Botham. I met him once. He's massive! His presence stunned me into silence. And not many people can do that!

What one or the other has done on or off the field is irrelevant to this specific situation. It has absolutely nothing to do with shaping the argument as to who hit whom, and who ran into where.

However I must say that, as an Aussie, I am more inclined to believe Botham. Chappell is forever rabbitting on about rubbish, and beefy truly did live up to his wild reputation.

Ian Chappell is an arrogant know-it-all who would have hated the fact a young, up and coming superstar was vocalising a victory in the MCG bar.

The way in which Chappell has latched onto this event far more seriously (re: the Ray Martin thing mentioned above) shows that his pride was dented far more, thus making me believe that he did get his backside handed to him by a younger, fitter and larger Botham.

All very interesting times. And who said us Aussies are biased eh? :D

Well, the actions of the man do speak for a lot. Yes, he has worked for charitable purposes too, but this is a man convicted of possessing cocaine, involved in many a well-publicised highly-questionable incidents off the field, one who lost a memorable court case to Imran, someone who ate his own words and toured Pakistan for the sake of some quick bucks as a commentator, and one never surely to stay away from raging controversy. Botham's autobiography paints a picture of a sore loser who thought he was the greatest despite having a miserable record against the best team of his era and repeatedly losing hands down to Imran in all-round battles of the 80s. It would come as no surprise that Botham is indeed "lying" as Chappell has stated and merely exaggerating his outward show of patriotism and Dutch courage by claiming that he manhandled the senior cricketer.

Botham , Kapil and Imran as allrounders were truly cricketing icons all over the world, players known to give their everything whether batting , bowling or fielding (or captaining). Combined with Botham's charitable work for a horrible disease , it is only fitting he get the highest national honours.Denying him the award for a bar fight ages ago is ridiculous , akin to denying a soldier a gallantry award for some petty incident.We need more icons like him associated with charitable work , especialy in a country like India with a lot of poverty , disease and destitution . I feel steve waugh should get knighted too.Also i hope when Tendulkar , Dravid etc.. retire , they get involved with such causes and stop toothpaste and shampoo endorsements.

I applaud Sir Ian for his achievements both on and off the field and have no issue with his knighthood. Congratulations. Those of you who write Chappell off as arrogant and opinionated might be interested to research his tireless work as a refugee advocate. You might not be quite so disparaging in your assessment of him. He is a humanitarian of the highest calibre. He just can't stand bull****. I agree that Chappell should indeed butt out. I also think that Botham does seem to be pretty adept at "gilding the lilly" with his tongue. As for Benn's "another example of Southern hemisphere sporting arrogance", Geez where did that come from. Might I suggest removing the enormous nothern hemisphere chip from your shoulder and just getting on with playing the game well enough to consistently challenge us colonials. The game is so much more fun to watch then. Bring back '95.

Siddarth Ian chappell gave it to Greg over the under arm incident and has said repeatedly that he did not agree with it.

As for arrogance how many autobiographies does one person need. Ian Botham was a good cricketer but Peter Roebuck stated that not a single line in his previous autobigraphy was credible and his knowledge of the history of the Ashes Urn was well and truly shown to be faulty when he and Richard Branson were trying to call for the MCC to give the urn to Australia.

Botham is trying to flog his book and the story becomes more fantastical with each telling. Next he will be fighting off a crocodile in a loin cloth before entering the bar.

Frankly, as a Pakistani, I was a touch biased when it came to judging Botham as a person. As a cricketer at his pinnacle, he rubbed shoulders with the best. However, due to his condescending attitude towards Pakistanis, not to mention his disparaging and derogatory comments against my homeland, it’s fair to say I wasn't too fond of Botham. Nevertheless, the work he has done for Leukemia and the way he has gone about ameliorating his image and reputation in the recent few years has gone a long way in helping him win a few more fans, of which I am one. I think it's grossly unfair for Chappell to castigate Ian or well accuse him of not being worthy of a knighthood. Frankly, that was for the British public to decide whether he deserved one or not, it is not mine or Chappell’s prerogative to comment on whether he should have gotten one or not. In addition, though, Chappel was a brilliant cricketer and is now an equally eloquent commentator, I believe credit should be given where it’s due. It is high time Chappel looks beyond his personal issues and learns to call a spade a spade. Botham, in virtue of his services in the field of cricket alone, deserved being knighted.

Neil, re:

>>As for Benn's "another example of Southern hemisphere sporting arrogance", Geez where did that come from.

"Geez", I guess that might come from every example of Antipodeans 'getting the sh1ts' when they get bested. I would guess you were another from down south who expected an Australia vs New Zealand Rugby World Cup final only to have your party spoilt by the plucky underdogs again; wipe the tears away old son.

>>Might I suggest removing the enormous nothern hemisphere chip from your shoulder and just getting on with playing the game well enough to consistently challenge us colonials. The game is so much more fun to watch then. Bring back '95.

"Aw, look mate" funny how quickly Australian's forget the '81 - '89 period, isn't it. Sport is cyclical and you will get yours, given time. Even Billy Birmingham takes the rise out of Australian commentator's arrogance......

Neil, you aren't Mr. Chappell in disguise are you?

Botham never succeeded against the West Indies in the 70's and the 80's, the Chappells, Imran, and Kapil did. I would therefore have to say that he was not among the best of his time. If a cricketer is going to be rewarded in part for his brilliance on the field of play, then he must excel against the best of his time.
I can think of at least ten cricketers who deserve this award more, including the wonderful WI captain Clive Lloyd, who helped to mould and shape the wonderful all conquering WI teams of yesteryear. What about Sunil Gavaskar and Alan Border? Both of these men were great players in their day and would certainly qualify more than Botham.

Why is that only now, Ian Chappell came out and questioned Botham's knighthood? If Chappell can find more decent people to have a drink, he should have been decent enough to put their tiff off atleast now and behaved maturedly.Trying to grab media attention? I hope that would be the last thing in Chappell's mind as he is already the most sought after commentator in the media circuit.

Chappell coming into the media precisely at this moment, unable to tolerate Botham's rise then and even now, underlines the fact that he was beaten black and blue by Botham in the bar. That puts the debate to rest.

I like them both as cricketers and commentators, but three things lead me to believe Chappell's version of events over Botham's. First, although Chappell was a bit before my time, everything I've heard from him suggests that he wouldn't run after a single punch unless Botham was really enraged. Secondly, as Rob Steen notes, Botham's story has grown in the telling, whereas Chappell's version has remained fairly consistent, at least as far as I know. Finally, Botham's physical feats in this story are virtually Herculean- outside of Westerns, I can't imagine anyone getting hit as hard as Botham claims to have hit Chappell without recieving at least a concussion. None of the versions I've heard or read mention anything like this, so either Chappelli's a cyborg or a leprechaun, if he can be hit like that and not even need a scan.

The English are hypocritical when it comes to modern sport

Sneering at other countries for being sports obsessed and lacking culture as compensation for their woeful sporting ability as they get thrashed at cricket/football/rugby league/union/tennis or any other sport that doesn't involve a pub

Then handing out knighthoods down to the waterboy when they actually win something once every 40 years or so

Botham sums the Brits up. Poor character, braggart and no stomach for a contest

Sir Botham

joke

i am not and don't even care about Poms or Aussies, so hear me out :D

Ian Botham was knighted solely on his charity work! If he got his knighthood for services to cricket, then all these arguments would be valid. But I still would think the guy deserves it more than someone like Sir Mick Jagger!
It's the highest honour you can give to a Brit, it's not a world honour so stop complaining and let these brits do their thing! It shouldn't bother non Brits as much as seems to do.

The Queen obviously wasn't impressed by his contribution to cricket, fair enough. But his charity work over the past few decades totally deserve it in my humble opinion. There are people all over the world who have been as good, or even better than Botham at collecting funds and raising awareness about illness related research, but don't take anything away from the work the guy HAS done.

nuff sed

Arise Sir Beefy.

The amount of good that has been done for charity by our very own. Long may it continue and long may the bric-bats too. The Bric-bats are back handed compliment I would say.

Cricket what "luverly cricket". At times cricket needs to be played off the field too. With Beefy it was always the case. You cannot take away non-cricket activities away from The Great. It all comes together.

Many a times have the Aussies have been at the receiving end on the field where Beefy has been the match winner for us.

As it has been said already, will the Non-English keep your distance please.

Keep up your good work Sir Beefy.

Phil

Garrulous G

As a proud Englishman I am probably biased towards Sir Ian, however, a greater Australian captain than Chappell was irked by said Chappell and I quote the one and only Steve Waugh"to say Chappell's criticism irked me would be an understatement.” He categorised the criticisms as "personal" and noted that Chappell, “always sweated on my blunders and reported them with an 'I told you so' mentality. And by the way the Chappell era was dreamed up and used as a title by ABC for a documentary. When I look back to the 70's this buffoon only played tests till 75 and was the main instigator of that despicable trait in modern cricket by any team-sledging. Ian Botham has his faults but is the better man.The New Zealanders labelled Chappell's team the Ugly Australians for their attitude and in particular his.Also remember Chappell scored 145 more runs in tests than Botham, but took 363 less wickets

Loved the earlier comment about rugby union, don't know why the individual who wrote it thought there would be a Kiwi/Oz final though seeing as how they were meant to meet in the semi final. Truth to tell though Rugby Union is only followed by private school boys and one or two others in two of six states in Australia so that comment probably didn't hit home too hard. As to Ian Botham and Ian Chappell well, maybe IC is like me and the very idea of kneeling or bowing before someone who has been granted incredible privledges on the basis of her ancestors having bigger swords than everyone elses ancestors does his head in. Not that I've seen the honours list this year, having made it plain I don't want any I don't bother checking, but I don't believe anyone who wasn't Ian Botham who did the same sorts of things he did for charity would have been knighted so it's a nonsense to say he received a knighthood on the basis of his charity work when other non celebrity charity workers receive at best a bauble. So the question is does he deserve a knighthood for his cricket? Is he a Bradman or a Sobers? A Hutton or even a Hadlee? Let's think sex - yes, drugs - yes, violence - yes, public nuisance - yes, drunk - yes, champion cricketer - for maybe five series he was great and in three tests he was otherworldly but no Sobers and certainly not a Knight.

Ian Chappell- It was interesting in the South African feed of 20-20 world cup hearing him isolated as a lone Australian from the traditional Bill Lawrie's etc of mindless Channel 9 bias. In South Africa, there are balanced commentators from round the globe- Bishop, Younis, Zaheer etc. Asia seems to be similar, though not sure what they hear. That doesn't go down well in Australia, but that's how Chappell earns his living, working in a braying pack attacking Muri or whoever. Of course, Mark Nicholas is trying to redeem his career by copying Chappell. It is all so transparent, it's pathetic. "Turn down the sound". Tony Greig was actually quite unaggressive during 20-20, has he no further financial benefits from Australian TV/cricket?

Many people here do not seem to realise that Chappell, although arbrasive and opinionated, did not bring up the incident about the bar fight because of Botham's knighthood, but because Botham had brought it up it in his recently released book. Chappell has said that Botham misrepresented the facts (and has said so before). It was in relation to Botham's claims , and what he thought were the flaws in Botham's character that the single knighthood reference was made. A storm in a teacup. Here in the UK there is widespread acknowledgement that Botham, whilst being a good cricketer (but probably not a great one - especially in the last five frankly awful years of his career) was a boor and a bully. Many of his team mates disliked him intensely as he liked to throw his weight around in the dressing room. Even his charity work has always had the air of self-aggrandisement (unlike Chappell, who despite being somewhat unlikeable himself, has been more circumspect about his charity work in the controversial area of refugee rights). The notion that is he jealous is absurd - Chappell was an immensely successful captain and remains a well-known pundit (who criticises Australian as much, if not more than, opposing teams). This is nothing to do with what 'aussies' and 'poms' are like but is a personal matter between two generally unpleasant men.