Sledging has always been a notorious element of cricket but if looked at it in hindsight, it does add some spice to the gentleman's game.
The history of cricket is sprinkled with many incidences of sledging in various forms and a compilation of the game's best sledges by Tech Mahindra doing the rounds on the internet throws an interesting glance at it.
Tracing its origin, it says even the great Dr WG Grace resorted to it in aplenty in his prime.
Once when given out leg-before in an exhibition match, he refused to walk saying: "They came to watch me bat, not you bowl".
He continued to play and in the same innings when the ball knocked off a bail, he replaced it and told the umpire: "It was the wind which took thy bail of, good sir."
The umpire replied: "Indeed, doctor, and let us hope thy wind helps the good doctor on thy journey back to the pavilion."
The best WG Grace sledge was on him, though, not from him.
Charles Kortright had dismissed him four or five times in a county game - only for the umpires to keep turning down his appeals. Finally, he uprooted two of Grace's three stumps. Grace stalled, as though waiting for a no-ball call or something, before reluctantly walking off with Kortright's words in his ears: "Surely you're not going, doctor? There's still one stump standing."
Recalling Sachin Tendulkar's debut in 1989, it said: "Sachin, not even old enough to get a driving licence, was facing the best bowlers in the business."
{{/usCountry}}Recalling Sachin Tendulkar's debut in 1989, it said: "Sachin, not even old enough to get a driving licence, was facing the best bowlers in the business."
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