'Fix your delivery or find another profession'

There was a period when doubtful actions were rife in Australian cricket and the Fleet Street press was convinced bowlers of this ilk were responsible for Richie Benaudrsquos team cruising to a 4nil Ashes victory To be fair to Englandrsquos fourth estate Sir Donald Bradman then a selector and an Australian Cricket Board member started a purge to eradicate dubious actions from Australian cricket This resulted in Australian fast bowler Ian Meckiff being made the scapegoat when he was noballed from squareleg at the Gabba Test in 196364 He never played Test cricket again Australian umpire Darrell Hair who lsquocalledrsquo Muttiah Muralitharan in 1995 That cutthroat approach is a far cry from the modern stance The officials got themselves in a bind when they misguidedly bent over backwards to accommodate Muttiah Muralitharanrsquos unorthodox action This shortsighted approach has resulted in all kinds of bends and flexes being allowed in the bowling action A resultant escalation in the epidemic will eventually force the administrators to either take drastic action or declare the game an elongated form of baseball Instead of looking to simplify the law regarding bowling actions the administrators have complicated the whole process Itrsquos reached the point where itrsquos a barristerrsquos dream and it doesnrsquot take a Rumpole of the Bailey to keep serial offenders playing the game Even worse the current drawn out process surrounding dubious actions doesnrsquot give the batsmen the appropriate protection in the middle Itrsquos a nightmare for a batsman when someone bowls most of the time and then suddenly chucks the odd delivery That makes it difficult to adjust and often a batsman becomes so aware of the dubious delivery hersquos fooled by a legal one No batsman wants a bowler thrown out of the game but he is entitled to be protected by a call from squareleg when a bowler transgresses Under the current law with all the piffle about fifteen degrees of flex and a long drawn out notification process this isnrsquot possible A bowler is noballed when he oversteps the frontline by a millimetre which makes absolutely no difference down the other end Yet batsmen arenrsquot protected when a dubious delivery which gives a bowler a huge advantage abbreviates his innings This is a denial of a batsmanrsquos basic rights The law needs to be modified to something really simple so the legal people canrsquot get their teeth into it in a court This way the umpire at squareleg will feel comfortable calling a noball on the field knowing he wonrsquot finish up in court defending his judgement against a barrister who doesnrsquot know the difference between a noball and no manrsquos land Any modification of the law will require a 12month leadin time so the current crop of bowlers can iron out any kinks in order to comply with the new regulations In the meantime officials need to be vigilant and strict in youth tournaments and any bowler with a doubtful action should be told ldquoFix your delivery or find another professionrdquo If these remedies arenrsquot adopted soon the copycat syndrome will ensure the market is flooded and then itrsquoll be difficult to tell the difference between the delivery of a bowler to that of a baseball pitcher If that occurs the stormy late fiftiesearly sixties period will be looked back on as one of relatively pure bowling actionsu00a0