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Mohammad Hafeez hits out at ICC over lack of consistency in reporting bowling actions
Mohammad Hafeez hit out at the ICC, stating that there should be proper guidelines in place that helps in identifying bowlers with suspect actions.
Mohammad Hafeez has taken a swipe at the International Cricket Council (ICC) nearly two weeks after the body cleared him to bowl following him being reported for a suspect bowling action.
This was the third time that Hafeez had been summoned by the ICC and the Pakistan cricket team all-rounder, upset over these repeated inspections, hit out at the ICC stating that there should be proper guidelines in place that helps in identifying bowlers with suspect actions.
“There are so many things influencing all this [who gets called for suspect actions], it has a lot to do with the power of [some] boards and nobody wants to take them on,” Hafeez told BBC Urdu.
“Mostly there are soft corners and relations between people which no one wants to spoil. What I say is why not implement the rule and get every bowler in the world to go through [testing]. What’s the difficulty in that?”
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Unlike the other advancements in cricket, like the use of hawk-eye, snick-o-meter and ultra-edge, a bowler’s action is only referred as a suspect one by the umpires.
There’s no technology involved and is completely based on the naked eye of the umpires. Hafeez slammed the move, stating that since his tests proved that his arm marginally bent over the permissible 15 degrees, it was impossible for the naked eye to track every ball with the same precision.
“When match umpires called me (for a suspect bowling action), I went for my test only to find the flex was recorded up to 16, 17 and 18 degrees,” said Hafeez, who was reported for a suspect action last year.
“I was surprised: how can anyone with the naked eye see flex from 15 to 16, and at times they are not able to call those whose flex is 25 and even 30-plus.
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“So I have my doubts about this calling system. This is suspicious, why are match referees or on-field umpires not able to see those flexing up to 35 but me with 16 degrees.”
Prior to this, Hafeez was reported for suspected bowling actions in 2005 and 2014.
