Darrell Hair, Doug Cowie and Malcolm Speed are only three officers and employees of the International Cricket Council, who are gold medal candidates when it comes to the "Foot-in-Mouth" stakes.
So are all the many people who were ensnared by the unique set of circumstances triggered off at 3.45pm eight days ago at The Oval by Hair's decision to make the biggest call of his controversial career when, without warning or even a quiet word, he publicly pinned Pakistan captain Inzamam-ul-Haq for collective responsibility for ball-tampering, because he could not identify which of his team had scuffed the ball.
What followed in the next two-and-a-half hours was a mixture of pure farce and muddled thinking by all participants, including Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer and match referee Mike Procter whose reputations as two men who had successfully bridged the gap between a distinguished playing career and becoming respected administrators were blown to smithereens.
Procter was the supreme governing authority at The Oval but, like the Scarlet Pimpernel, has been invisible and inaudible while the Hair saga has unfolded. Yet the South African must have been in the middle of all the frantic negotiations that took place while the 23,000 crowd was shamefully left in total ignorance.
No chance of Procter competing in the "Foot-in-Mouth" stakes, because he is on record with only one quote - "There are a number of issues raised by the on-field umpires to be resolved."
The ICC Code of Conduct gives referees the right to overrule umpires, which suggests he had the power to order the match to restart after Hair and Billy Doctrove had awarded a forfeiture victory to England on the grounds that Pakistan refused to play.
He might have had two problems. Did Hair and Doctrove refuse any request to abort their forfeiture decision? If they did, they would have been backed by the third and fourth umpires, so Procter would have been helpless. Secondly, do his supreme powers extend to the laws of the game? i.e., Law 42.2 which says "the umpires shall be sole judges of fair and unfair play."
Procter was contacted from Dubai by telephone by Speed who desperately asked him "is there no way that the game can be restarted?" The answer he got will be a crucial factor when the disciplinary charges against Inzamam will be heard next month.
The only man to say nothing in the last eight days is Procter. Normally, he would chair the meeting to hear the charges but Ranjan Madugalle was immediately named instead.
It now appears that the ball had been scuffed - Woolmer is on record as saying, after becoming one of the few people to examine the ball: "I have seen it and would describe it as in the early stages of scuffing."
Really? If that is not an admission of something, what is? The ball was examined four overs earlier when Alastair Cook was out and then bore some evidence of the mayhem inflicted by Kevin Pietersen's savage innings.
But, in the next four overs, one boundary was hit, yet Hair and Doctrove apparently decided that new finger-scratching marks had appeared.
Hair had two choices - to call Inzamam over and have a quiet word, or do what he did. On went the traffic-warden authoritarian cap, and the rest is history. Hair is an experienced umpire and knows when something illegal has happened, even if he can't finger an individual.
Now for Inzamam. He is not quite the amiable big figure portrayed - he has enough previous form, including ten appearances for alleged breaches of the Code of Conduct, to justify him claiming a call of "season ticket" when named again.
The charges include accosting a spectator, dissent, publicly criticising opponents' delaying tactics and conduct contrary to the spirit of the game.
His successor as captain will surely be the impressive Younis Khan who stood in so well when Inzamam was off the field with injury at Headingley; it is reported that he pleaded with his intractable captain and colleagues to go back out and pursue their grievance at close of play.
He was joined by one other man, which brings us back to someone who is rapidly becoming an unbelievable verbal chameleon, Woolmer. Firstly, he claims he thought of resigning a week ago. Then, he said that he backed his captain and players all the way and would stay.
Now for the cherry-on-the-cake, in yesterday's revelation by Barry Jarman, match referee during a series between India and South Africa, then coached by Woolmer, in 1997.
The Australian said in an interview with the Brisbane Courier Mail: "I kept the match ball, which was only 16 overs old when I ordered it to be changed. One side has been tampered with and you can see where they have run their fingers down the seam, which opens up and traps the sweat and meant that one side was heavier than the other.
"I noticed the ball was always going to two particular players and I started watching through binoculars. Even when the bowler fielded the ball, he threw it to one of the two designated to mess around with it. I watched the ball start to swing everywhere and walkie-talkied to one of the umpires. I told him to grab the ball and he told me the seam was lifted.
"I sent a box of balls out and we changed the ball. That led to an altercation with Woolmer. He raced into my office and asked what was going on? I told him his guys were stuffing around with the ball and I told him who it was. He went out with his tail between his legs and I told him if he wanted to pursue it, I would give it to the press. The two players came up to my hotel room and apologised."
That sounds like a pretty conclusive case for the prosecution, unlike the case for the defence. Woolmer says of the alleged incident nine years ago: "The two umpires in South Africa from that match don't remember the incident, and I have never been involved in a match when a ball has been replaced after 16 overs.
"I don't wish to denigrate Barry but I haven't a clue where this is coming from. It is ridiculous that he should come out with the story now after what has gone on this week. It's almost as though he's suggesting I am teaching ball-tampering."
Woolmer closed his quoted defence with a gratuitous remark that borders on the offensive. "He's quite old, isn't he (Jarman is 70). Maybe he's got confused." Suggested senile dementia is quite a defence, even from a shoot-from-the-lip man whose stature in the game is rapidly diminishing.
As for three principals in the farce, starting with Hair and that fateful email asking for #270,000 to go quietly, sent to Cowie, the manager of the elite panel of international umpires. Speed later suggested it was written while Hair was under stress but the umpire denied this yesterday.
A killer of an opening sentence says "Just to firm up what we discussed earlier." Namely, that he had outlined his plans to Cowie, whose response was an incredible "your email has some merit."
The New Zealander should have told Hair to press the delete button and he would do the same - all over, with no recriminations. Instead, Cowie forwarded it to Speed and David Richardson, ICC's manager of all cricket and another lawyer.
They took advice and rightly decided to publish, as keeping quiet would have amounted to withholding evidence from Pakistan, who naturally have jumped on it as another example of Hair's faulty judgment.
At Friday's momentous press conference, Speed faced both ways - praising Hair as a top umpire and hoping he could continue to stand, and then admitting he had told him he was not being sacked, suspended or charged with anything but "that I can't guarantee that position might not change."
On Saturday, he repeated that, "although much water needs to pass under the bridge, Darrell's next match is due in the Champions' Trophy in India in October and I hope he will be there."
With nearly half the sides in that tournament from the Asian sub-continent, such an idea is ludicrous, if only from a security point of view. The latest contradictory Speed update - and they come as quickly as his name suggests - is that "I hope we can find a way for Hair to continue but I'm not sure that will happen."
By his own precipitate action on the field and off it with his email, Hair has pushed his employers into an impossible-looking position. The game will survive but he might not - unless the silent Procter can help him. He is the man who saw and heard most of last Sunday's shenanigans, yet has said the least.
