TO SAY that Darrell Hair is no stranger to controversy is like observing that Kevin Pietersen is on nodding terms with his bathroom mirror. It was inevitable that the 53-year-old Australian umpire should be involved in something contentious this summer; the miracle is that he stood in two Test matches between England and Sri Lanka in May and June without any hullabaloo.

Hair is a veteran of 76 Tests, the fourth-most experienced official in the history of the game, so the ICC must feel the Australian is doing something right, but he has a knack of being at the centre of storms.

Already he is unpopular with Pakistan supporters after a series of contentious decisions in the winter series against England and the third Test of this series at Headingley Carnegie, where many felt he gave too much benefit of his doubt towards the England batsmen.

So aggrieved was the Pakistan Cricket Board after Hair’s display at Faisalabad and Lahore in November last year that it considered asking the ICC to replace him for their series against India in January. Two years earlier, Hair had also raised hackles by reporting Shabbir Ahmed, the Pakistan fast bowler, to the ICC for a suspect action.

Yet his judgments have sometimes benefited Pakistan. In 2003, he annoyed South Africa during their tour to such a degree that Shaun Pollock, the fast bowler, was fined his match fee for telling Hair what he thought of his decisions.

In 1994, Peter Kirsten, the South Africa opening batsman, was fined 65 per cent of his fee for what Wisden called “an animated conversation” with Hair over leg-before decisions.

Hair again attracted controversy in 2000, when he no-balled Grant Flower, the Zimbabwe left-arm spinner, three times for throwing the ball. But the most notorious of the arguments in which Hair has been involved was in the Melbourne Test between Australia and Sri Lanka in 1995, when he called Muttiah Muralitharan, the off spinner, for throwing seven times in three overs.

Arjuna Ranatunga, the Sri Lanka captain, first led his players off the field, then returned and brought Muralitharan on to bowl at the other end, where Steve Dunne was the umpire.

Dunne later pointed out that the rules at the time were that any suspect action should not be called immediately but rather be reported to the match referee, who would have the bowler filmed, and that the ICC, not the umpire, would decide on the legitimacy of the action.

Hair received death threats, compounded when he called Muralitharan’s action diabolical in his autobiography and when John Howard, the Australian Prime Minister, weighed into the dispute.

Muralitharan had to be subjected to laboratory analysis to prove his innocence and after being subjected to ridicule from Australia fans, threatened never to play in the country. He returned last year for a tsunami relief charity match, which was umpired by Hair. The men said before the game that they had settled their differences.

Hair stood in his first Test in 1992, between Australia and India at Adelaide, and swiftly made his mark in a 38-run victory for Australia. Wisden noted that the game was marred by controversy over leg-before decisions.

A year later at the same ground, his judgment went against Australia when, with the home team needing one run to win, he gave a marginal caught-behind decision to West Indies.

In 2003, Hair moved to England, saying that it would cut down the amount of travelling he would need to do as a member of the ICC’s ten-man elite umpires panel.

“I intend to be actively involved in umpiring for the next few years, whether it be with the blessing of the ICC or village mates in Steeple Bumpstead,” he said.

If that is the case, club cricketers might be excused apprehension should they arrive for a fixture next season at the North Essex club and see a portly, bespectacled man in a white coat striding out to the middle.