Cricket: Hair falls foul of subcontinent players - again

Controversy has dogged series between England and Pakistan for quite some time, but it has also followed Australian umpire Darrell Hair around as well.

After the Headingley Test two weeks ago, it was reported that Pakistan had made an official complaint about Hair and had objected to him standing in this match, claiming that they found his manner towards them "dismissive" and "rude".

They also felt he had made some less than accurate decisions against them.

Apart from the stature accorded him by his position, physically Hair is an imposing figure on the pitch, standing at 6ft 4in.

He was born in Mudgee, New South Wales, and as a fast bowler played for the North Sydney and Mosman clubs in grade cricket before becoming a first-class umpire in 1988.

He made his international umpiring debut in a one-day game in the World Series Cup between West Indies and India at Adelaide in 1991.

His first Test, which was also at the Adelaide Oval, came a year later and was between Australia - this was in the days before it became compulsory to have two neutral umpires standing - and India.

Including the current match, he has umpired 76 Tests and 122 one-day internationals.

Oddly, although he is Australia's most senior umpire, the 53-year-old is now resident in England and, unbelievably, only on the England and Wales Cricket Board's reserve list for umpiring duties.

He is most definitely not a popular figure on the sub-continent and fell foul of Pakistan back in the winter when they made it clear they did not want him to feature in their recent series against India.

Hair had been due to stand in the first Test in Lahore.

Such disputes have a long history.

In 1995, Hair called Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan for throwing the ball seven times.

In '96, India felt some of his decisions went against them in the Test series in England.

In 1999, Hair had a row with the then India coach Kapil Dev which began with Hair walking up to Ajit Agarkar during a game against New South Wales in Sydney when the medium pacer expressed disappointment at a decision.

Then, when a television replay showed Hair's colleague was wrong with another decision, the burly Australian reportedly warned the India captain, Sourav Ganguly: "You are not supposed to watch replays and make gestures.

The Pakistanis did it and now if you do it you will get into trouble." Ganguly's explanation fell on deaf ears.

It is thought that the sub-continent's complaints played a big role in the Australian umpire being left out of the International Cricket Council's elite panel of umpires when it was first constituted in 2002.

Hair is not the first umpire to annoy a side.

England had a flashpoint against Pakistan in the 1987 Test at Faisalabad when captain Mike Gatting led his side off the field in protest at the umpiring of Shakoor Rana.

Similarly, the implication of ball tampering appears to have been the last straw for the 2006 Pakistan squad.

- INDEPENDENT