Saeed Ajmal’s ban will hit Pakistan hard but ICC right to clamp down

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2014/sep/09/saeed-ajmal-ban-pakistan-icc

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It did not take long for the conspiracy theorists to get into full voice. The laboratory whence came the results of the testing on Saeed Ajmal is in Brisbane. In Australia. And Australia are about to play Pakistan. So his suspension by the International Cricket Council for illegal bowling action is nothing more than a ruse to neuter Pakistan and help Australia. QED.

It has long been apparent to anyone who has watched Amjal in action, for Pakistan or for Worcestershire, that there have been times when things just did not look right. Most specifically this appeared to be when he bowled his doosra, the leg-spinner bowled ostensibly with an off-spin action.

Consensus has it that unless there are physical quirks or abnormalities as possessed by Muttiah Muralitharan, this specific type of delivery is all but impossible to bowl with an arm that conforms even to the broad 15 degree parameters that have been in place for a good few years. Surely no one though believed that he transgressed not just with the doosra but with every single delivery he sent down, even the standard run-of-the-mill off-break?

The real surprise is that Ajmal appeared unable to tone things down even for the testing procedure. One of the criticisms of the way in which the ICC has approached the growing trend towards illegal actions is that when push comes to shove, it has been thought easy to beat the system under that sort of scrutiny and then to revert during match conditions.

There is more to it than simply analysing someone in an indoor or outdoor environment. The electronic equipment used to detect the angles of the arm and the speed are sophisticated. The bowler must reproduce the same speeds and spin rotation as in match play, and there is comparison with real-time down to ultra-slow footage. Thus, it has become increasingly difficult to camouflage faults and certainly Ajmal appears to have been unable to do so.

It would appear that finally the ICC is clamping down heavily on this particular threat to the integrity of the game having let it slide for too long. Here, the legacy of Muralitharan plays a part. He has always divided opinion but no cricketer has been more scrutinised and, continually, he passed the required tests under the most stringent conditions.

The problem has emerged from others attempting to replicate what he actually achieved through a physical anomaly. This they just cannot do. In the last few months the Sri Lankan Sachithra Senanayake and New Zealand’s Kane Williamson have been banned and earlier in the year the West Indians Shane Shillingford and Marlon Samuels were similarly censured, each for different reasons. Credit then to the ICC for recognising the problems and starting to police them.

What this means for Ajmal’s international career is unclear. The Pakistan Cricket Board has already announced its intention to appeal the decision through the Bowling Review Group, consisting of a member of the ICC Code of Conduct Commission, a ICC match referee, a former international player, a former international umpire, and a human movement specialist, with the ICC general manager (cricket) as an ex-officio member of the group. The appeal has to be lodged within a fortnight of the suspension.

Ajmal seems confident he will be cleared on the basis his arm has a deformity caused by a childhood accident. Presumably though this is something already taken into consideration both now and the first time that he was tested (this is the second occasion his action has been called into question officially).

If his suspension is not overturned and he receives a year’s ban from international cricket, it might well signal the end of his career at the top level. He is the top bowler in the ICC ODI rankings and as such a vital part of Pakistan’s World Cup campaign. He is also in the top 10 Test match bowlers.

It would not be quite as simple as just “sorting out his action”. He is 36 years old, long in the tooth to be starting to tinker. In the past, spin bowlers have remodelled actions to a satisfactory degree, most famously the England left-arm spinner Tony Lock, but these have generally involved a single type of delivery (Lock threw a very quick faster ball), with the most obvious solution being just to stop bowling it.

Ajmal would certainly be capable of bowling in an orthodox legitimate fashion but in so doing he would be emasculated, back in the pack. He would lose the essence of what made him, quirky or not, such a formidable performer. Unless he is cleared by the BRG it is hard to see him returning to the top.