Sunday, September 14, 2014

The banning of Saeed Ajmal - what is the priority? Answer: to get him playing again. Method - legalize 40 degrees of elbow straightening for the weak-throw/ back-chuck

*

When a great bowler is banned for so-called throwing (actually, the back-chuck 'weak throw' - palm facing the bowler, used by a spinner - is not-at-all what was meant by throwing when laws were made against throwing), yet, if people are honest, there is no real problem with the 'gut-level fairness' of Ajmal's bowling method

- it is not dangerous
- it does not give the bowler an unfair advantage
- indeed Ajmal's is an extremely difficult type of delivery to master and nobody else has succeeded in mastering it...

Then the priority is to change the laws of cricket in such a way as he can play again.

If, as some leaked ICC reports suggest, Ajmal was straightening his elbow by 40 degrees in some deliveries, and given that cricket lovers have all delighted in the immaculate bowling of Ajmal for several years at the highest level - then we now know that 40 degrees of elbow straightening should be allowed for the weak-throw/ back-chuck.

40 degrees therefore needs to be set as the new standard (while retaining 15 degrees as the maximum straightening for the strong-throw - with palm facing the batter).

*