let's start with the leaked Procter report.
Cookies must be enabled. | The Australian
'Procter said in his written statement that Tendulkar could not have
known what was said in the controversial exchange.
"It was submitted to me by Chetan Chauhan (Indian team manager and
former member of parliament) that there was doubt because the umpires
and other players did not hear the words but, in my judgment, they
would not have been in a position to hear them," Procter wrote in a
statement after the hearing.'
OK... so Procter decided Tendulkar and the umpires could not have
known what was said.
Now... yes... I did see the headline at the top of that report from
The Australian and I read the first paragraph. I think it's a poor,
possibly dishonest piece of editing. What they have is Procter saying
that in his judgement SRT couldn't have heard what was said. There is
no quoting of any testimony by Tendulkar. If there were then the press
could have had a field day "SRT says THIS to Procter, says something
else outside of the hearing." But they didn't go that route.
Now the joint statement from players on both sides prepared ahead of
the Hansen hearing and signed by, amongst others, Ricky Ponting and
Andrew Symonds.
You can read this at
http://tinyurl.com/3wn3k8h
The relevant passage is this:
"However all of the players who gave evidence to the hearing before
Match Referee Procter of what was said between Harbhajan Singh and
Andrew Symonds namely, Harbhajan Singh, Andrew Symonds, Mathew Hayden
and Michael Clarke, are all clearly of the view that in the
circumstances, Harbhajan Singh used language that was (and intended by
Singh to be), offensive to Andrew Symonds."
There's a list of players who gave evidence before Procter. I remind
you that Tendulkar, Symonds, Singh and Ponting signed this document.
Note that Tendulkar's name is not in that list of players giving
evidence to Procter.
Hansen's report can be read athttp://tinyurl.com/3qqohy9
Note that he reproduces the text of the joint statement of agreed
facts in full.
Two sections of that document have some relevance here.
1) "Mr Symonds accepted that Mr Tendulkar of all the participants was
closest to Mr Singh. A viewing of the video shows that people were
moving around but certainly Mr Tendulkar appears to have been closest
to Mr Singh in the course of the heated exchange we are concerned
with. Contrary to reports that Mr Tendulkar heard nothing he told me
he heard a heated exchange and wished to calm Mr Singh down."
Note Hansen's wording - "Contrary to reports..." not "Contrary to his
testimony before Mr Procter..."
2) "Mr Procter also noted in his decision that he did not consider the
umpires or Mr Tendulkar were in a position to hear the words. I have
of course had the advantage of seeing extensive video footage which in
fact establishes that Mr Tendulkar was within earshot and could have
heard the words. Indeed it is now clear Mr Tendulkar did hear the
exchange but not the words alleged."
There it is again. Procter decided that SRT hadn't, indeed couldn't
have heard anything.
So Tendulkar did not tell Procter he didn't hear anything, Procter
made that judgement - the two are NOT equivalent. It is not the case
that SRT said one thing before Procter and another before Hansen.
