A blow by blow account, sort of, of cricket’s chewing gum tradition

Bio-bubbles, no relation to Michael Jackson’s pet chimp Bubbles, are everywhere. The IPL players are currently in one in the UAE. The other day, Virat Kohli reminded players, perhaps itching to get out and about in Dubai, “We are all here to play cricket…The bio-bubble needs to be respected at all times for the tournament to happen eventually. We are not here to have fun and roam around and you know say that ‘I want to hang out in Dubai’,” the Royal Challengers Bangalore and India captain said.

Until coronavirus forced cricketers and everyone else to turn into wall hangings, there was only one bubble that was associated with the sport – the one made from bubble gum, or sometimes with chewing gum. All bubble gum is chewing gum. All chewing gum isn’t always bubble gum. This is an important fact of life we must recognise at this crucial juncture in human history.

No cricketer made gum as fashionable as Viv Richards, of course. The West Indian legend seemed to say to bowlers I’m going to do to you what I’m doing to this strip of Wrigley’s. It also helped him settle his nerves. In fact, he felt the gum was his companion.

“I always enjoyed my chewing gum. You have 11 men out there and the umpires -- you felt outnumbered. And that was my little piece,” Richards once said. “It made me sort of look cool, calmed me down, it gave me sort of a rhythm. That was a companion for me at the time. It got a bit stale if you are batting long enough but it was all good.”

When Richards retired he perhaps filled a kangaroo’s pouch with gum and sent it to the Australian dressing room. The Aussies seem the modern upholders of the gum tradition. And like Richards, they go at it with gusto. In the film Miss Congeniality, Michael Caine, tasked with bringing some refinement to Sandra Bullock’s steak-chomping character before a beauty pageant, says to her of her eating habits, “I was distracted by the half-masticated cow rolling around in your wide-open trap.” He would have something similar to say to Richards and the Aussies. And they’d laugh him out of the room.

Then there are the bubble blowers. While fielding, batting or strategising, Aaron Finch often inflates a golf ball-sized balloon from his lips. So does Marnus Labuschagne, who has used the therapeutic powers of gum and bubbles to deal with the pressure of facing a lethal Jofra Archer moments after he had felled Steve Smith with a 96.1 MPH bouncer at the neck. This was at Lord’s last year, and it made Labuschagne the first concussion substitute in international cricket.

"It (chewing gum) was something I used because at times you play so much cricket and you need something to get you going and to get you in the contest,” Labuschange said in an interview about his habit, and not the Lord’s incident specifically. “It's helped me to relax especially when I'm subconsciously blowing bubbles and keeping my mind at rest between balls."

In India chewing gum is associated with arrogance, and perhaps that is why it is hard to remember many Indian players taxing their jaws. Maybe they are too sorted to need a minty anxiety vent. Plus, they always have to be wary of the moral brigade. Even someone of Kohli’s stature was not spared by online patriots when he was spotted chewing gum during the Indian national anthem. Off-spinner Parvez Rasool, only the second player from Jammu and Kashmir to play for India, was also sent to the detention room by the self-righteous for committing the grave sin of chewing gum before a T20 game against England.

Later, Rasool seemed irritated by his minor oversight being blown out of proportion by trolls. “It is already very difficult for cricketers from our region to make it into the national team and when these things happen it is very disheartening. One has to remain tough and should not give importance to such controversies,” he said.

Next time, he should just unleash Richards on the nitpicking whiners.