ICC Secret Seven

[Warne is god]

From the Herald Sun:

Chuck wagon to roll secret seven
Robert Craddock and Ben Dorries
17nov04

SEVERAL of cricket's most famous bowlers, but no Australians, are on a seven-man hit list that is the target of the game's new chucking laws.

The list of names – drawn up by the ICC's special sub-committee – will rock the cricket world.
It contains not only Muthiah Muralidaran, but also blue-chip bowlers such as his Sri Lankan teammate Chaminda Vaas, Indian spinner Harbhajan Singh and Pakistan superstar Shoaib Akhtar, who have taken more than 2000 international wickets between them.

West Indian Jermaine Lawson, Pakistan's Shoaib Malik and Bangladesh's Sanwar Hossain are also under intense scrutiny as cricket prepares to introduced a major overhaul of the way it polices suspect actions.

The actions of the seven bowlers stood out as being highly suspect in exhaustive slow-motion testing to finetune the new chucking guidelines.

But Aussies Glenn McGrath, Brett Lee and Jason Gillespie are in the clear, despite Muralidaran on Monday asserting new technology had revealed the trio were all breaking the rule by straightening their arms beyond the current limit of 10 degrees.

Relations between Muralidaran and the Australian cricket side have dipped to a frosty low.

Australian Cricketers' Association chief executive Tim May, who yesterday addressed the issue with the Australians in Brisbane as they prepared for tomorrow's Test against New Zealand, was clearly unimpressed with Muralidaran's claims.

"I sat on that sub-committee and I don't know where those figures come from," said May, who helped frame the proposed new laws after viewing extensive research.

May refused to comfirm the identity of any bowlers on the hit list.

Australian batsman Matthew Hayden said the fast bowlers were "a little bit disappointed" with Murali's comments.

"Sticks and stones in the paper is going to get Murali no favours among world cricket," Hayden said.

McGrath and Gillespie have applauded the proposed new law, which will enable all bowlers to flex their arm to 15 degrees.

"At first I thought the new rules were coming in for the sake of it and I was against it," McGrath said.

"Now that I've looked into what it entails, I'm now all for it. To have a method of testing which is pretty exact from high-speed cameras is the only way to do it," McGrath said.

"It can be a lot more exact. To me, it's set the standard. It takes out a lot more grey areas."

Shane Warne said the key to the new rules was having the players abide by them, but he hoped they did not dissuade umpires for no-balling a bowler if they felt his action was illegal.

"If they think some bloke has a dodgy action, I'd still call them," Warne said. "With so much furore made over certain bowlers who have been called over the years, the umpires hopefully aren't too scared to call anyone."

But former New Zealand captain Jeremy Coney feared cricket could become "hijacked by science" and said the game has made a "compromise call" by allowing bowlers to straighten their arms to 15 degrees.

"We are on the verge of legitimising what's been going on for the last few years," Coney said in Brisbane.

"I'm sorry that Murali has had a bent arm since birth, but we either take a stand now or find people pushing it more and more so that 20 or 22 degrees becomes the norm one day.

"You face a fast bowler with a bent-arm action. You can't see the ball. It will be plain dangerous."

[Neil Pickup]

Aww, I thought this was gonna be a story about Mani, Dalmiya, Speed, Holding, Bucknor, Bowden and Gavaskar rescuing a stranded puppy dog from down a well, and getting home in time for cookies.

[masterblaster]

Surprised to see Chaminda Vaas in there to be honest....but other than that I don't really have much to say on it all.

[Sanz]

I think this piece was written in hurry and the author was still in the retaliation mode.

Btw I have a question for those who are questioning as to how Murali got his figures about Mcgrath, Gillespie & Lee, What do you folks say now ? How do you think Mr. Craddock got those names ?

[Langeveldt]

J1ver

[Warne is god]

I was surprised to see Vass there, he's fine in my opinion.

[Slow Love™]

This story is bogus.

ICC Dismisses Reports of Bowler Hit-List

The International Cricket Council today dismissed claims appearing in the Australian press that it had drawn up a 'hit list' of bowlers to be targeted over their actions.

ICC General Manager - Cricket David Richardson who chaired an expert sub-committee which discussed the issue of illegal actions said the suggestion that the panel had compiled such a list was nonsense.

"To say that the ICC has a specific list of bowlers under scrutiny is completely untrue," said Mr Richardson.

"The expert sub-committe was convened to look at the overall picture of the current regulations for dealing with potentially flawed bowling actions.

"It dealt with principles and processes not personalities. It had no mandate or responsibilities to report on specific players or their bowling actions and at no stage did it do so.

"It is disappointing that this report has appeared without any attempt to discuss this issue with the ICC. One phone call prior to publication could have dealt with this."

[Warne is god]

Interesting. In 2-5 days we see who is lying.

[Dasa]

I'd rather trust the ICC than the Hun.

[Slow Love™]

The Secret Seven was a really cool set of children's books. Did Enid Blyton write those, or was that the Famous Five? Or did she write both?

[JASON]

This idiot Craddock is notorious for trashing Murali !!

His sole purpose in life it seems is to hound Murali .

So I am hardly surprised by the rubbish he puts out .

[LongHopCassidy]

I wish I'd voted in the ICC poll as them "unable to organise a pi$$up in a brewery."

They change the rules to allow chucking, then they embark on a witch-hunt to eliminate chuckers from the game?

Hypocrisy, I call it.

[LongHopCassidy]

And for your information Slow Love, Enid Blyton did indeed write both series.

[marc71178]

Originally Posted by LongHopCassidy

I wish I'd voted in the ICC poll as them "unable to organise a pi$$up in a brewery."

They change the rules to allow chucking, then they embark on a witch-hunt to eliminate chuckers from the game?

Hypocrisy, I call it.

You really don't get it do you?

[Slow Love™]

Originally Posted by LongHopCassidy

And for your information Slow Love, Enid Blyton did indeed write both series.

Aha... I still remember that Comic Strip parody of the Famous Five by Adrian Edmondson, Rik Mayall etc. "Lashings and lashings of ginger beer".

She sure had a habit of ripping off her own ideas though. I can't remember there being that much difference in concept between the Faraway Tree and the Wishing Chair either.