“Criticize me I wont mind but please don’t abuse my family.”

That was Wahab Riaz’s message on twitter after Pakistan lost against India in Asia Cup and Wahab gone for 50 runs in 4 overs without a wicket in that match. When abusing didn’t stop even after this tweet by him, he de-activated his twitter account to avoid such abusive behavior. Last year when Pakistan lost world cup semi final to India, a number of Pakistani fans were praising Wahab for his bowling performance of 5/46 in that semi final. A few weeks ago when Pakistan lost ODIs & T20s series against England hundreds of Pakistani fans were abusing captain Misbah. I myself received so many disgraceful texts about the Pak captain that I can’t repeat those here. When Pakistan whitewashed England in test series, most of such fans were showering praises on Misbah & team Pakistan, they were calling them their true heroes & lions. It has been the attitude of sub-continent cricket fans since long that one day they worship their cricket heroes and the other day they want to kill him. Even the legends like Wasim Akram & Sachin Tendulkar have faced such ‘SILLY CRITICISM’ by the angry fans. Cricket or any other sport is for fun and entertainment of the people and they should enjoy it instead of being aggressive by the result of the game. If we are true fans of the game then we should appreciate the good performer and encourage those who couldn’t perform well on a given day.

Such aggression isn’t shown only by fans but so many times cricketers behave in this way as well. Virat Kohli, one of the most talented batsmen of this era, is often found using foul gestures while playing. After the Asia Cup match between Pakistan & India a picture was posted by some newspapers/websites, showing the reaction of three century makers of that match on completion of their centuries, in which Hafeez & Nasir were bowing to Allah whereas Kohli was abusing. Prior to that during India’s visit to Australia, Kohli signaled ‘Middle Finger’ to the crowd while fielding in 2^nd test match in Sydney. It’s really hurting to see such attitude of a top-class player. India’s tour of Australia in 2007-08 was marred by the famous Monkey-Gate incident, which had even threatened the tour being cancelled. Andrew Symonds reported that he was called a monkey by Harbhajan Singh (all those who understand Hindi & Urdu know very well what Harbhajan actually said in Hindi). Players shouldn’t cut loose they should remain cool-headed and need to remember sports are not a war. You try your level best to win but appreciate your opponent if he performs better than you.