Captains facing rebuke from referee over poor conduct

The captains of England and India will receive an official telling-off before the third and final Test at The Oval next week after a match of genuinely tough and competitive cricket here was overshadowed by poor behaviour in both teams.

The rebuke will come from the International Cricket Council's chief match referee, the former Sri Lankan captain Ranjan Madugalle, who expressed concern that the match at Trent Bridge would be remembered not for the fine contest it was but more for England's puerile jelly bean prank, for excessive "sledging" and for Indian pace bowler Sree Sreesanth's headstrong attempts at intimidatory bowling.

Madugalle said that he will remind England's Michael Vaughan and India's Rahul Dravid of their responsibility as captains to ensure that their players behave within the substance and spirit of the laws of cricket.

Speaking after India had completed their seven-wicket victory, Madugalle said that while he had spoken to representatives of both teams about their conduct at Trent Bridge he would not officially address Vaughan and Dravid until the eve of the series decider.

"I'll have a word with the captains then," Madugalle said. "The most important thing is for the captains to realise their responsibilities and for that to cascade down to the rest of the team. People should remember the game for the quality of cricket that is played, that is the bottom line."

Madugalle fined Sreesanth half his match fee for what was seen as an avoidable collision with Vaughan at the wicket in England's first innings. The 24-year-old later unleashed a "beamer" at England's Kevin Pietersen and forced Paul Collingwood to take evasive action from a bouncer delivered from two feet beyond the bowling crease, which Vaughan described as "something you don't want to see in the game".

The so-called jelly bean incident, in which India's match-winner with the ball, swing bowler Zaheer Khan, reacted angrily to finding sweets placed at the crease when he went out to bat, is unlikely to attract further punishment after being dealt with on the field by umpires Simon Taufel and Ian Howell.

But it has brought further embarrassment for Vaughan, whose leadership this summer has suffered the distraction first of the "Fredalo" affair, for which he had to issue a personal apology over remarks made in an interview, and now this, in which he has felt obliged to apologise on behalf of his team.

"We weren't throwing jelly beans at Zaheer from the slip cordon but I think two were left on the floor by the stumps at the drinks interval," he said yesterday. "I guess one of the players might have left them as a little bit of a prank for the new batsmen and if it offended him in a huge way we apologise for that."

Vaughan was keen to leave the incident behind. "It has been blown out of proportion because it is a great story," he added. "But in the bigger picture it is not the reason we lost the game. If Zaheer says he was inspired by it I would say that he bowled pretty well in the first innings too and at Lord's."

Vaughan denied that England's general behaviour, which brought criticism of James Anderson among others for aiming verbal volleys at opponents, had gone too far.

"I don't think we stepped over the line," he said. "Maybe we said a few things too much in the first innings but it's called gamesmanship, I don't think we've said anything untoward. We are just trying to play tough cricket and that's what most teams do at this level."

Meanwhile Dravid, tongue in cheek, said he would be happy for England to continue to provoke Zaheer. "If he is going to perform like that can you please get him upset every game," the captain said. "I have never seen him as fired up."

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