"The core elements of rule of law discourse which are so deeply embedded in cricket as a practice became basic normative references for opponents of the imperial master and the hypocrisies and contradictions of colonial rule. The role of cricket in the former English colonies demonstrates most clearly its contradictory character and its dialectical potential as a text which can and does provide a utopian vision for the future of the interpretive community. Cricket is both an imperial Victorian game and the 'national' game of India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, the West Indies, Bangladesh and Australia. 'Each of the interpretations is true and each has the capacity to serve as the basis of a myth. The interpreter has to choose. At this level, at least, cricket far outstrips law as an important national social artefact."

"One more aspect of the cultural heritage of the interpretive community of cricket (at least in [[Australia)], the West Indies, South Africa, [[New Zealand)], and England) is the historical 'fact' of the link between cricket and both the traditional values of Christianity and the emerging Victorian ideological practice of muscular Christianity in the English public schools and the tradition of imperialistic missionaries. The Protestant ethic which informed Victorian social and legal practices and norms permeated cricket as well. Erich Geldbach goes so far as to propose a Weberian analysis positing the theory that: Both the socio-economic...system of capitalism and modern athletics can be traced back to the setting of ascetic Protestantism which acted as a 'cultural catalyst' to bring about modern capitalism and modern sport. Whatever the final resolution of the Weberian and anti-Weberian chicken and egg debate about Protestantism and capitalism, it is quite clear from out understanding and knowledge of the game that there are obvious parallels between the ethical content of the 'spirit of the game' and certain popular versions of Christian morality. 'It's not cricket' resonates as condemningly as does 'It's not the Christian thing to do', in what many continue to assert are 'our' moral practices."

"Despite the obvious historical and ideological unity of cricket and imperial Christianity, we are faced here again with competing versions of the truth. If such a connection really exists, why did it take Knott's conversion to illustrate for him the error of his ways? Why were the imprecations of those who condemned the events in question as violations of the moral code of cricket ineffective? Does this indicate that there is a conflict or that while there may be a practical conjunction one can heed the code only when its source is not human law but God's Law? Can only Christians be true cricketers? Can true cricketers be non-Christians? In the Indian context, can only Hindus be 'Indian' cricketers? What are we to make of the 'Islamic' nature of Pakistan and Pakistani cricket and Yusef Youhana, a Christian Test player? The debates over natural law versus human positivism are as central to the understanding of Noonan's jurisprudence as they are to the understanding of cricket. There are, of course, counter-Christian narratives or different Christian narratives in cricket which contradict and enrich the story just as there both secular and competing Hindu or Islamic renderings of the complex texts and practices of Indiana and Pakistani cricket. A triumph over one narrow view of Christianity served to 'democratize' the game permitting the playing of the game on Sundays in England by melding capitalism and anti-Puritanism in an interesting and textually complex Weberian interpretive ploy."

"Anyone who really plays well at cricket will never give attention to lawn tennis. The monotony of the game will choke him off."

"If I knew I was going to die today, I think I should still want to hear the cricket scores."

"That cricket is going to stay in India there cannot be a shadow of a doubt; it has taken hold all over the country, and chokras can be seen playing in every village with any sort of old bat and ball that they can lay hands on. I should hope that it will do something to get over any racial antipathy; for instance, it must, I think, bring the several races together more and more, in a spirit of harmony that should be the spirit in which cricket is played. Unquestionably, it arouses excitement and enthusiasm, and extreme ambition that one's own side should succeed, but it also ought to lead to friendliness, and that is what is needed in India. East will always be East, and West, West, but the crease is not a very broad line of demarcation – so narrow, indeed, that it ought to help bring about friendly relations."

"I was brought up to believe that cricket is the most important activity in men's lives, the most important thread in the fabric of the cosmos."