Former Austalia captain Ian Chappell has suggested a radical move that he believes may end the issue of players altering the condition of the ball using illegal means.
The ball-tampering controversy has been hogging over headlines for the past few days after Cameron Bancroft, who was caught using a piece of yellow sandpaper on the ball in the 2018 Newlands Test against South Africa, recently hinted that more players may have been in the loop about ball-tampering.
However, the Aussie bowlers have denied the claims, Cricket Australia (CA) has remained silent after expressing their desire to reopen the case.
In an interaction with ESPNCricinfo, former Australian skipper Ian Chappell suggested that the ICC should take advice from players on what items they want to use to shine the ball. He added that the international body can choose one 'viable' option from these and legalize it in the game to avoid any further illegal ball-tampering
"I think about 20 years ago, I said what they should do is go to the captains of every country and you get a list of things that they think will help the ball swing. Then you send us all these lists, we'll go through them and we'll come up with one thing and it will be a sensible thing, not using a bottle cap to scrape the ball.
“It'll be viable but we'll give you one thing that'll help you swing the ball and everything else will be illegal," Ian Chappell told ESPNCricinfo.
Chappell remarked that controversies like sidearm bowling, body-line, the underarm ball only arise because the game is in the favour of the batsmen.
"Maybe I am naive but think if you did that, you might stop all the other shenanigans because you give them something in return. Let's look at the way the laws are written. They are pretty much always written in favour of the batsman.
“if you go right back to underarm bowling to sidearm bowling... to body line and ball-tampering - they all come about because the balance is too much in favour of the batsmen and the bowlers eventually say 'we have had enough, we are mad as hell and we are going to do something about it,” he said.
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Talking about Sandpaper gate, Chappell said that he believes that the issue may spring up again after David Warner retires and his autobiography comes out.
"There have been a few suggestions that when David Warner retires, he's going to write a book and tell the 'whole truth and nothing but the truth' and with that sort of hanging in the air, I don't think there's any way this thing is going to die," he concluded.
(ESPNCricinfo inputs)
