not cricket
1
9.9
- idiom
- /nɒt ˈkrɪkɪt/
- UK
:
no es justo
- It's just not cricket, baby. DR. EVIL
Examples
-
- That's not cricket at all.
-
In the sense of fair play, that was "not cricket."
Academic text (2000) -
- It's not cricket, boys.
-
"This is not cricket," he said.
Fiction book (1993) -
- That's just not cricket.
-
It's just not cricket.
-
This is not cricket.
-
It's not cricket.
-
That's not cricket!
-
Cheating during the game is just not cricket.
Synonyms
7
4.9
Behaving unfairly or rudely during a game
1
5.6
Acting unfairly in a game or competition
Antonyms
16
3.0
Honest behavior that treats everyone the same and follows the rules in sport or competition
How Fair
Surface Forms
Morphology
The sense 'unfair or improper' is not directly derivable from the literal parts 'not' + 'cricket' because 'cricket' names a sport and does not transparently encode the abstract notion of fair play for most learners. This is a culturally specific British idiom, so a B1 learner who only knows the constituent words would probably not predict the idiomatic meaning without prior exposure.
Etymology
Not cricket comes from the sport cricket, where fair play and polite behaviour were expected. If a player broke the rules or behaved badly, people would say it was not cricket, so today the phrase means 'unfair' or 'not proper'.