Not Cricket

This essay examines the ethics of a variety of on-field practices which are often thought to be unethical, including failure to walk when one knows one is out, appealing when one knows the batsman is not out, and 'Mankading'. Consequentialist, deontological, and virtue ethics perspectives are brought to bear on these practices. The essay also examines the dynamics of the relation between moral considerations and the emergence of new laws regulating cricket. An important illustration of this is the bodyline controversy of 1932, when a moral outcry led to significant changes in the Laws of Cricket. It is concluded that cricket's distinction between what is permitted by the Laws and what is morally permissible is a desirable feature of the game, although the precise way in which this distinction is drawn can and should be open to the possibility of change in response to evolving societal values.