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'It’s a quizzical situation’: Wasim Akram voices disagreement against ICC’s saliva ban

The coronavirus outbreak brought most sports activities to a halt with players practising social distancing and self-isolation during the pandemic.

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Former Pakistan cricketer and legendary fast bowler, Wasim Akram, has expressed his thoughts on the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) decision of banning the use of saliva to shine the cricket ball, as a precautionary measure against the coronavirus.

Speaking on the topic, Pakistan's 1992 World Cup-winning skipper claimed that bowlers will struggle to generate swing in such a scenario and will need to wait for the ball to get old.

"It will make bowlers robots, coming and bowling without swing," Akram told news agency AFP.

"It’s a quizzical situation for me as I grew up using saliva to shine the ball and to swing it."

"I am all for precautions in these tough times, so bowlers have to wait for the ball to get old and rough for them to get swing," he added.

The coronavirus outbreak brought most sports activities to a halt with players practising social distancing and self-isolation during the pandemic. Bowlers use their saliva or sweat to shine the ball to generate the extra bit of swing and now it seems to face a huge hurdle.

"Sweat is just something of an add-on, a top-up. Too much use of sweat will leave the cricket ball too wet," he said.

"I believe that they will need to find a reasonable solution. Artificial substances like vaseline could be used to swing the ball but how much of it?"

"Let’s see, we have this England versus the West Indies series to judge how it goes, because I have never experienced this thing," he added.

 

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