Former Australia fast bowler Brett Lee believes that it will be very difficult to keep off the natural habit of using spit to shine the ball in the cricket that’s something the players have been doing over the years.
Recently, the International Cricket Council’s Cricket Committee led by Anil Kumble recommended a ban on the use of saliva to shine ball, though, said the players can use sweat, in its meeting in order to avoid the spread of the COVID-19 which has halted the game since last 3 month.
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In the wake of the global Coronavirus pandemic, the International Cricket Council (ICC) has made it clear on Friday (May 22) in its guidelines that saliva should not be applied on the ball when the game resumes ensuring everyone’s safety in this time of global health crisis.
The Australia pace great said going against the usage of the saliva on the balls will be difficult to implement and he hopes for some leniency from the world cricket body regarding the same.
Lee said on Star Sports’ show Cricket Connected: “When you have done something your whole life from 8,9, 10 years of age where you lick your fingers and you put on the ball, it’s very hard to change that overnight too. So, I think there’s going to be a couple of occasions, or there’s going to be some leniency I think from the ICC, where there may be warnings. It’s a great initiative, it’s going to be very hard to implement I think because cricketers have done this for their whole life.”
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Meanwhile, veteran South African batsman Faf du Plessis also agreed with Lee, saying even he is habitual of a bit of his spit on his fingers before catching the ball in the slips.
Du Plessis added, “For the fielders, it’s the same. As Brett [Lee] mentions, I’m used to taking a bit of spit on my fingers before I catch the ball at slip. If you look at someone like Ricky Ponting, he has a big spit on his hands every time he tried to catch a ball.”
(With IANS Inputs)
