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Considered a de facto captain of the India bowling unit during his time in international cricket, Zaheer Khan is embracing a formalised leadership role with Delhi Daredevils in the twilight of his career

Arun Venugopal in Rajkot03-May-2016Zaheer Khan is the only bowler captain in IPL 2016. This isn’t the first such instance – Shane Warne, Anil Kumble, Harbhajan Singh and Daniel Vettori have led with varying degrees of success in the past – but it is significant on two counts.Firstly, Zaheer’s elevation, in tandem with a new coaching staff, has turbo-charged a franchise numbed by continuous failures in the past. Secondly, and more importantly, Zaheer’s tactical smarts have finally been recognised with an official title. Not that he ever needed one, as for years he was India’s de facto bowling captain: formulating plans, managing fields and counselling youngsters. MS Dhoni once said he was the Sachin Tendulkar of the bowling unit.Following his retirement from international cricket, Zaheer has used the same style sheet at Delhi Daredevils with greater gusto. Watching him do his job is to watch a leader who has climbed up in the hierarchy through plenty of elbow grease. With his shabby stubble and tucked out jersey, he looks the part. Even Zaheer’s field placements tell you appearance comes a distant second to efficiency.In the first over of Gujarat Lions’ innings, Zaheer stood only one delivery at square leg before moving to cover to remain within the bowler’s overshot. When he came on to bowl to Dwayne Smith in the third over, he had a straightish mid-off and a short cover. When Brendon McCullum came on strike, the short cover, Sanju Samson, went to a third slip. Daredevils’ fielders had to cope with not just rotation of strike but also Zaheer’s high-speed field shuffle.While he was bowling short and at Smith’s body, the length to McCullum was fuller. Ahead of the fifth ball, Zaheer pushed midwicket to the line and opened up a big gap in front of square on the leg side. He delivered a cutter, and McCullum, shaping to pull towards the vacant region, realised belatedly the ball wasn’t as short and lost his bails.As soon as the over was completed Zaheer was swiftly by Shahbaz Nadeem’s side, second-eyeing the field the bowler had asked for. Smith’s dismissal, though, involved no great strategy as the West Indian punched it uppishly straight down long-on’s throat.Zaheer then brought long-on in with a short fine leg already in place. After three incident-free deliveries, Aaron Finch gave himself room and biffed one over mid-on for four. The field remained unchanged, and Nadeem went fuller the next ball. Finch brought out the slog sweep, but top-edged it to Rishabh Pant, who was placed at short fine leg for precisely such a shot. Three wickets fell in eight balls, a phase that Lions coach Brad Hodge felt had dragged his team behind.Zaheer continued to work the batsmen out. When Chris Morris bowled short to Suresh Raina, he had a leg gully in place and soon an uneasy flick flew over the head of the fielder. There were some unusual fields too. Zaheer had a short cover point – who was only a few yards away from being called a silly point – and backward point for Dinesh Karthik, with a sweeper cover and long-off in the deep.Going round the stumps, he bowled full and outside off to bring his fielders into play and subsequently dried the boundaries. In the 17th over, Zaheer bowled with no one inside the circle on the leg side, and exploited the relative slowness of the surface with his knuckleballs. He continued to attack even during the last five overs – where only five boundaries were scored – by having at least one fielder in a catching position. Daredevils batsman Sam Billings said Zaheer sets such unorthodox fields even at training.”He set a field to me – Mohammad Shami and one of the young guys were bowling yorkers – that was totally out of the box,” Billings said. “There was no long-on, he kind of moved around to cow corner because he knew I was a slogger anyway.”As a batter, you don’t know he’s going to bowl a yorker. He can bowl a bumper, he can bowl a slower ball. Knowing exactly where the bowler is going to bowl makes it a lot easier. Zaheer is turning the tables on that and giving the bowlers more options.”Pant, who scored 69 in Daredevils’ chase of 150, said Zaheer’s field placements were never random acts.”Zak bhai has a different field placement in every match because we plan according to [opponents],” he said. “We are not just going to the ground and putting fielders here and there. We just plan and are executing that.”While Zaheer’s mental agility and street-smartness has not dimmed with age, he has had a history of injuries. For Daredevils to go the distance, his physical fitness will be just as critical as the mental.

13-Aug-2016The other overnight batsman, Kraigg Brathwaite, tickled a leg-side delivery to Wriddhiman Saha to give R Ashwin his first wicket•Associated PressMarlon Samuels and Jermaine Blackwood then put on a 67-run fourth-wicket stand to take West Indies past 200•Associated PressBut Bhuvneshwar Kumar dismissed both of them in quick succession shortly after lunch•Associated PressBhuvneshwar finished with a five-wicket haul as he ran through the middle and lower order in a fine display of swing bowling•AFPWest Indies lost their last seven wickets for 23 runs as they collapsed to 225 all out•Associated PressKL Rahul and Shikhar Dhawan put on 49 off 45 for the opening partnership as India chased quick runs•Associated PressBut Miguel Cummins dismissed Rahul and Virat Kohli, and Roston Chase got Dhawan, as India slipped to 72 for 3•Associated PressAjinkya Rahane (51*) and Rohit Sharma (41*) then saw India through to stumps with an unbeaten 85-run stand that extended their lead to 285•AFP

Part-time offspinner Martin Guptill proved to be quite effective – and rather lucky too – in one bizarre over in Delhi

Arun Venugopal20-Oct-2016Martin Guptill had an interesting day at the Feroz Shah Kotla. He walked out to bat in the afternoon heat. Two minutes later, he was walking back after having added no runs to his small aggregate on the tour. Guptill then spent a couple of hours watching Kane Williamson do his thing before returning to the field.Under lights, Guptill flung himself around the Kotla, using his long arms to cut off speeding balls. He did not have much else to do, that is until the 41st over, when Williamson summoned him to the bowling crease. Guptill was up against Axar Patel. His first ball drifted down the leg side for a wide. For those who missed it, Guptill did it one more time. Before Williamson could consider developing a temper, though, Guptill waddled in and bowled a full toss against which Axar unleashed a mighty whack. Six? Four? No. Mitchell Santner, haring in from long-on, lunged forward and pouched the ball inches off the floor.And so Guptill had his third ODI wicket in his 131st match; he marked the occasion with another wide down the leg side, this time to Amit Mishra. Three more deliveries went by, uneventfully: one, one, dot. Just in case boredom was setting in, Guptill struck once more; Mishra top edged a swipe to be caught by substitute fielder Doug Bracewell at short fine leg. Guptill responded with another – by now signature – wide down the leg side. A plain, old, length delivery for no run finally finished the over. Guptill walked away with a sheepish grin.Ten deliveries, one bizarre over, and two dismissals that hurt India in their chase of 243.

A Mitchell Starc special, Angelo Mathews’ injury and a select club constitute our plays from the fourth ODI between Sri Lanka and Australia in Dambulla

Brydon Coverdale31-Aug-2016The first-over wicket
Talk about throwing a kid to the wolves. Avishka Fernando, 18, entered this match without having played any senior cricket at all – that is, no first-class, List A or domestic T20 matches. He had impressed for Sri Lanka’s Under-19s, but walking out to open against Mitchell Starc is quite another matter. Especially given Starc’s record of striking in the first over of an innings. Fernando blocked his first ball but was trapped lbw from his second by a quick inswinger. It meant that for the fifth time from 10 innings across the Tests and ODIs on this trip, Starc had made a breakthrough in the first over of the innings.The Pereras
Three Pereras – Kusal, Thisara and Dilruwan – played in the earlier matches of this series, but Sri Lanka’s selectors decided they still didn’t have enough. And so for the fourth ODI in Dambulla, they decided a fourth Perera in Angelo was necessary. Just to confuse matters further, they batted respectively at Nos. 6, 7, 8 and 10, which meant that often a pair of Pereras batted together, and sometimes one replaced another. For the record, 12 Pereras have played first-class cricket in Sri Lanka in the past year, so there is scope for an entire team of Pereras, plus one to carry the drinks. A policy of one Perera per era would make things much simpler.The rough time
Glancing at the scorecard will reveal nothing of what Angelo Mathews went through in scoring his 40 from 71 deliveries. On 2, Mathews ducked into a bouncer from Scott Boland and was struck on the helmet, the protective flaps flying off on impact. He needed a few minutes to compose himself and receive some treatment from the physio, but Mathews batted on. Then when he was on 6, Mathews pushed a single to mid-off and had to duck to avoid the fielder’s throw that whacked him in the head again. Finally, on 28, Mathews clipped one to leg and took off for a single, injuring his right calf in the process. He limped off the field to retire hurt. Mathews hobbled back out there near the end of the innings to add 12 more runs, and was the last man out from the sixth ball of the 50th over.The drop
It wasn’t easy, but it was costly. The eighth ball of Australia’s innings was lofted down the ground by Aaron Finch off Amila Aponso. Thisara Perera misjudged a chance to take the catch at mid-on, having to backtrack at the last minute and thrust his hand over his head. The dropped chance came with Finch on 4. He went on to equal the record for the fastest ODI fifty by an Australian, and ended up with 55 off 19 balls.The no-ball
At 131 for 3 and with Australia speeding along at more than nine an over, Sri Lanka needed wickets. Dilruwan Perera duly obliged, bowling Travis Head with an arm ball. But umpire Michael Gough asked the batsman to wait while a potential no-ball was checked. And indeed, Dilruwan had overstepped. The first no-ball of the series came four matches in, from a spinner, from a ball that took a wicket. Ouch.

The 25-year-old beat his injury-prone body and a six-year absence from top-flight cricket when he turned out for Brisbane Heat on Tuesday

Jarrod Kimber at the Gabba03-Jan-2017A giant of a man stands at the non-striker’s end. His hand is on his right hip as he waits to face his first ball. There is talk about whether it is the hip that he broke when bowling or just the hip that had a congenital malformation. No one can remember. Trying to work out what has happened to Nick Buchanan’s body is like trying to remember an Alastair Cook nudge. Andrew Symonds on commentary says he has “had everything from flat feet to dandruff”.Buchanan wasn’t supposed to be playing in this game, this BBL, or really, at all. Even this afternoon he travelled to the match thinking, “I’m probably going to be 12th man again.” Which was good, because when you have been waiting this long, the last thing you want is to know you are playing too early. “I didn’t stay up all night not sleeping, stressing and worrying, I just got to the ground,” he said.Mark Howard points out that in the time since Buchanan last played at the top level, Australia has seen four Prime Ministers. In the cricket world, Pat Cummins had just played a Test and Ed Cowan was the opening bat. That is a long time to wait to get your second chance at Big-Bash cricket, and now Buchanan has to wait a little longer as Joe Burns takes a single from the last ball of the over.Someone in the press box makes a joke about Buchanan getting run out without facing. Then someone adds: and gets injured doing it. A Brisbane Heat employee tells him to be quiet. In Queensland cricket there is no more popular cricketer, everyone wants Buchanan to do well. They have seen what happens when he doesn’t.Buchanan has overcome things with his body that normal cricketers don’t overcome. Hips, groin, and ankles have all taken a beating, there have been reconstructions, rehabilitation, a shoulder injury from batting and once he self-diagnosed a groin injury and went off to start his rehab. Buchanan was blessed with an incredible body, and cursed by not being able to use it properly.It takes four balls for Buchanan to get on strike at the Gabba. When he does, he lines up more like a batsman, not a slogger, with an almost Peter Handscomb-like stance. His first ball isn’t a big swing, he does the team thing and gets Burns back on strike by dropping and running.A few weeks ago he was promoted in a club game, something which, at 25, he has played very little of, and made 73 off 40 for the Gold Coast Dolphins. Before that, he took three wickets in a T20 game. For a normal player that wouldn’t be enough to get a call-up to the Heat squad, but Buchanan isn’t normal.If that wasn’t clear by his shock call-up when Josh Lalor was injured, then it should become clear from just the way he moves. When Burns hits the ball into the outfield, Buchanan is running twos in giant smooth strides while Burns looks exhausted and well behind him. At one stage he almost laps Burns, wanting to turn a two into three. His father, former coach John Buchanan, spent years talking about the perfect cricket athlete. One look at Nick, who resembles a gigantic version of Khal Drogo from but who runs like one of Drogo’s stallions, will make you think he has bred one.

On the 26th of December he was a club cricketer trying to make a comeback to professional cricket, and on the 3rd of January he’s playing in front of 30,000 people

Buchanan faces only one of the first 10 balls he is out in the middle. The rest of the time, he is running hard for Burns or waiting for never-ending run-out replays to see if Burns is caught short of his ground scrambling for a two. Buchanan seems to complete it before the throw comes in. When he finally gets on strike again, a slower ball tricks him, and instead of using his power, he just takes another single.Other than smashing a few for the Gold Coast Dolphins recently, and his general physicality, there are other reasons to believe that if Buchanan hits the ball it might disappear. Like when Matthew Hayden described him as an Aussie Andrew Flintoff.He shouldn’t even be facing the last ball of the innings; he could have easily run a two, but Burns is too tired and so Buchanan comes on strike. The last ball he faced in the Big Bash before his break was a short one from Clint McKay; he was dismissed treading on his stumps. This is of the same length, but it is met with a big swing. Buchanan starts running as it goes towards the long boundary. It’s a long six.Buchanan is already tearing from the field. His team-mates line up to pat him on the back, but he smiles and rushes past them. They want to celebrate with him; he wants to get ready for the next innings.As he arrives for the huddle, a player from the dug-out comes over to pat him on the back. The speech goes on for a minute or so, and towards the end of the team talk he starts to smile. The small smile becomes a massive one; it’s clear the talk is mentioning him. He is brimming. You can easily see why when he isn’t playing cricket he’s modelling.For the last ball of the opening over he gets pushed back to long-off, and straight away Jason Roy opens up and slams one just to the right of cover and Buchanan is off. He has to travel about 40 metres, and no human being alive could make it, but it gives you the chance to see him at full stride, you can see why he played schoolboy rugby for Australia.Nick Buchanan returned to top-flight cricket after a six-year absence•Getty ImagesAfter six overs, Buchanan has not been asked to bowl. It’s a long wait for a seamer, but considering Buchanan’s recent history, it’s nothing. There was a time in his life when all that waiting turned dark. And instead of spending time on his rehab, he went to look at the bottom of a bottle. He was the son of Australia’s coach, a perfect specimen, a Queensland Flintoff, and he couldn’t get on the field. The bottle might have been a bad choice, but it was an obvious one.But Buchanan was sick and tired of living that way, and he didn’t want to be the cricketer who could have been. He wanted to be the cricketer who was. So he stopped drinking, took up yoga, found a celebrity ironwoman partner (the David Warner way) and rededicated himself to cricket. He didn’t have instant success, he barely had any success at all, but he stuck with it.One over after the Powerplay ends, there he is, standing at the top of his run-up, his man bun falling into a ponytail, and Brendon McCullum beside him asking about the field. He looks so big you could imagine McCullum was about to ride him into battle.In 2011, playing his first game, he was bowling to Nic Maddinson and Brad Haddin. “I felt like I was going to forget my run-up, forget how to bowl,” he recalls. Today he looks calm, happy. He is no longer the young man with the high expectations. He is older; he recently played a club game where he was the oldest on the field.As he comes in to bowl, you can see the number 16 on his back. His last over in Big-Bash cricket went for 16, “I got spanked, it haunts my memories a little bit.”He runs softly through the crease; there is no leap. It looks like a cotton-wool action, but he stands very tall. His first ball is short of a length outside off stump, and it bounces over Moises Henriques’ blade. His pace says 132kmh, Andrew Symonds suggests on commentary he is usually quicker than that. He almost takes a wicket when an inside edge from Henriques just misses off stump. The over goes for six runs; Buchanan has escaped it in cricket terms, and in injury terms.

Buchanan was blessed with an incredible body, and cursed by not being able to use it properly

Buchanan is known to have that mythical quality of bowling a ‘heavy’ ball. He smashes the bat, above the splice, Burns said recently he clocks over 140kph. When he has played a game near the top level, he’s been very good. In a game against Ireland before their 2015 World Cup campaign, he took 1 for 22 off six overs. There was a 5 for 51 against Loughborough MCC XI, and at the Under 19 World Cup he took eight wickets in three matches, including 4 for 16 on a day he came into the attack after Kane Richardson and Josh Hazlewood. But in October, he was taking 1 for 45 for the Gold Coast seconds.In the next over, McCullum says on the mic that Buchanan is probably a bit nervous. Considering that on the 26th of December he was a club cricketer trying to make a comeback to professional cricket, and on the 3rd of January he’s playing in front of 30,000 people and bowling at two of the most in-form players in the country, you can understand why.McCullum keeps Buchanan on. He starts with a length ball to Henriques, who has so far missed, edged and completely mistimed three of the four balls he has faced from Buchanan. From the fifth, a straightish length ball, he tries to smash him straight. Instead, that extra bounce hits high on the bat. And yet again, Buchanan is forced to wait.He has been around the top level of Australian cricket since 2009. He has been given five years of professional contracts with Queensland, offered a two-year deal with Western Australia, and has been involved in underage cricket and performance squads since he was a kid. He has spent most of his time as a professional cricketer in rehab watching his friends and team-mates play, and now he is watching again as Mark Steketee comes under the ball.It only takes a few seconds, but actually, it has taken seven years, and after all that time, Nick Buchanan has his first-ever top-level wicket.It won’t be a honeymoon game for him; he will force an error from Daniel Hughes later, a top edge that will go for six handing him a 17-run over. Brisbane will lose in the last over, and Buchanan will finish his three overs with 1 for 29. He will say, “You never want to be on a losing side, and as much as it was a comeback game for me, I saw it as just another game of cricket, and you want to win. It was no different tonight.”It was different tonight. “It wasn’t my greatest night,” he said, but that’s where Buchanan is wrong. He will play better; he might even have a full career and finally see if all that potential he had when he was young when matched with an incredibly professional work rate can get him into the Australian side as he has always dreamed. But even if he plays for Australia, it will be tonight, when he wasn’t supposed to be playing for the Heat, when he’d been playing club seconds a few months ago, when he thought he’d be 12th man that was his greatest night.When Buchanan hit that six, it made an almighty crack, but instead of standing there and enjoying it, “It was a big boundary, so I just put the head down and ran.” He does’t see the bowler’s look of disgust; the leg-side boundary riders arch their heads up, the crowd rises from their seats or the umpire raise his arms. As he outscored his entire Big Bash career in one hit, he was turning to run the second one hard.Nick Buchanan has been running hard for a long time. Tonight, he didn’t have to.

On the field, they are among Indian cricket’s hardest competitors. Off it, Abhishek Nayar and Dinesh Karthik share a unique mentor-pupil relationship

Arun Venugopal04-Jan-2017In the opening round of this Ranji Trophy season, Tamil Nadu had begun well in the second innings after being bowled out for 87 in the first dig on a greentop in Lahli. Dinesh Karthik was at the heart of his team’s effort to set Mumbai a competitive target, and had begun by hitting a four and a six. But he was out trying to paddle-sweep Balwinder Sandhu, a seamer, and his dismissal triggered Tamil Nadu’s collapse from 129 for 2 to 185 all out.Mumbai nearly botched their chase of 97 and got there with only two wickets in hand. When the dust settled, Karthik’s shot selection came under the scanner. At the end of the match, one of the first people Karthik sat down with for a debrief was a member of the opposition, Abhishek Nayar. Nayar, incidentally, was the calm head that had steered Mumbai through a nervy chase.Nayar says he discussed the process and not the consequences with Karthik. “I don’t focus on whether he played a good or bad shot, it’s just why he played that particular shot and I try and understand that,” he tells ESPNcricinfo. “I don’t think he played a shot like that in the season going forward, not because I told him not to but because he understood why he could have done something else.”This wasn’t just the vanquished seeking out the victor for a one-off chat. For over a year, Nayar has been Karthik’s go-to man for counsel. Nayar helps Karthik with his pre-match preparation, and together, at the end of every match, they review Karthik’s performance. Whenever Karthik finds time, he takes the flight to Mumbai to stay with Nayar and train with him. During the times Karthik can’t be there physically, Nayar is just a phone call away. It’s a unique mentor-pupil relationship between two active cricketers, who, apart from a season for Kings XI Punjab in 2011, have rarely played on the same side.At 31, Karthik is two years younger than Nayar, and they have known each other since their Under-16 days. Karthik can’t remember when he decided to approach Nayar, but they have always been good friends and so they “kind of got talking.””A lot of times people didn’t understand me that well, but I thought he really connected with me very well,” Karthik tells ESPNcricinfo. “He was also in a space where he was willing to give me some time and hear me through. I can definitely say after I started talking to him I’ve become a much better player, a far more consistent player.”Nayar doesn’t reveal the details, but says he plans specific sessions in accordance with Karthik’s needs at different stages. While most of his work with Karthik during a tournament involves discussions on the cricketing side of things, their off-season preparation features physical fitness and mental conditioning.”He normally stays with me and we plan a training programme,” he says. “Then, during games, he calls me up before every game, and in the two-three days break we plan them and we plan the games as well. He likes everything to be specific and immaculate, and wants to know why we are doing a certain thing and how it will benefit him.”During the IPL, it was about planning his innings, his mindset before the game and understanding what situations he may face, and discussing the bowlers before the game. I wasn’t part of the IPL last year, so it was easy for me to watch every single game he played. Before any tournament, we focus really hard on his preparation, his programmes and what he needs to do as a build-up to the tournament.”Apart from Karthik, Nayar also assists the likes of Andhra’s Srikar Bharath and Bengal’s Abhimanyu Easwaran with their preparation•BCCIWhile Nayar can’t put a name to the kind of work he does – “I just call it helping out someone” – Karthik feels “life coach” is an apt title. “For about 15 years, it’s Mr Basu, who has been the Indian team’s trainer, who has always been there for me,” he says. “He has definitely been one of the most important persons.”In the last 15 months, Abhishek has been a huge help. He is a lovely guy and we are very fond of each other. He and I have one thing similar – we pushed ourselves a lot more than most people would have, in different ways. He has probably pushed himself a lot more physically. I have tried to mentally push my barrier.”He is somebody who isn’t as talented as some cricketers, but he has really overachieved in terms of where he’s ended up, playing for India. He was a touch unlucky sometimes not to get picked [for India], but he’s had a great cricketing journey. I don’t think I’ve given him any sort of help whatsoever. If anything, he’s given away a lot of time and energy to me, but not vice-versa.”Nayar says he has always derived satisfaction helping players achieve their dreams. Making tough decisions at a young age about his cricketing career, he says, taught him understand life better. “Since a young age I have been the kind of guy who gives advice to his friends, and have taken important decisions also in my family,” he says. “I have had faced a lot of difficulties growing up – there are a lot of personal things I don’t want to talk about – so understanding life from my point of view and from my family’s point of view kind of helped me.”Karthik says he aspires to do something like Nayar. “I’d like to be somebody who can help a lot of people and genuinely that’s one of the things I want to do,” he says. “I don’t want to just share my experiences – that is one small aspect – but I want to hear people out and genuinely give them feedback.”Nayar says his relationship with Karthik doesn’t involve financial considerations. “I am not a very money-minded person. So, it is for the love of the game and the fun of helping someone,” he says.So, is mentoring a career option for Nayar, who already runs a cricket academy in Mumbai, after his playing days are over? “I don’t know, man. I
haven’t thought of anything right now. I never started doing it thinking Icould keep doing this later on. I do it because I enjoy it. It depends how it goes, it is going well so far and guys are doing well and very happy. As long as I can keep doing it, it doesn’t matter.”Nayar also assists other players, such as Srikar Bharath of Andhra and Abhimanyu Easwaran of Bengal, in their preparation. “He’s helped so many people. In the last couple of years, one big name most people know is Rohit Sharma,” Karthik says. “Rohit always trains only with Abhishek. Off late, there is Shardul Thakur and Shreyas Iyer from the Mumbai team.”According to Nayar, his team-mates don’t mind him helping out players from other sides as long as they are beneficiaries of his assistance as well. “For me, it doesn’t matter you are playing against each other. In this game, everyone knows what each other’s flaws are,” he says. “If I can help someone out, so be it. It doesn’t matter if he scores a hundred or a zero against us. I think helping someone out is more important.”Nayar and Karthik, though, abide by a mutual code where they don’t communicate with each other before a Mumbai-Tamil Nadu game. At Lahli, they spoke only after their game concluded, and with the semi-final in progress, they haven’t talked for more than a week now. On the field, though, they go hard to each other. Nayar was visibly disappointed when he beat Karthik’s bat in the first innings without finding the edge.”I think he wants to take my wicket very badly, and I definitely want to score runs off him, so that way the competitive edge is there for both of us,” Karthik says.Nayar too says he doesn’t let friendship come in the way of competition. “On the field, I am playing for Mumbai and he is playing for Tamil Nadu and we are opponents,” he says. “I didn’t have the chance [to sledge DK during the Lahli game] because he didn’t bat that long. But, next time if I am in the position and if I feel I should sledge him, I will. But, I know sledge doesn’t have an impact on him.”

Also, who has a higher Test batting average than Don Bradman?

Steven Lynch26-Sep-2017Who is the oldest century-maker in first-class cricket? asked Tim Bentley from England

The answer here is WG – but probably not the one you might think. WG “Willie” Quaife of Warwickshire was 56 years 140 days old when he scored 115 against Derbyshire at Edgbaston in August 1928, in his 719th and last first-class match. Quaife broke the record set by the more famous WG – Grace – who hit 166 for London County against MCC at Crystal Palace in 1904. The first 61 of those runs came on Grace’s 56th birthday (July 18), and the rest the following day.Between them the two WGs occupy the top six places in this particular list, both of them making three after turning 54. Next comes the long-serving Leicestershire left-hander John King, who made 114 against Sussex in Hove about a fortnight after his 54th birthday in 1925.The last 50-year-old to make a first-class hundred was the former England captain Gubby Allen, with an unbeaten 143 for Free Foresters against Cambridge University at Fenner’s in 1953. DB Deodhar scored 105 and 141 for Maharashtra in a Ranji Trophy match against Nawanagar in Poona in 1944-45 when he was nearly 53, and the following season another legendary Indian, CK Nayudu, made two centuries for Holkar: 101 in the Ranji Trophy semi-final against Mysore (in a total of 912 for 6) in Indore, and 200 in the final against Baroda, also in Indore. He was 50 at the time.Was Kuldeep Yadav the first bowler to take a hat-trick against Australia in a one-day international? asked Steve Rafferty from France

Kuldeep Yadav’s fine feat in Kolkata last week was India’s first hat-trick against Australia in a one-day international, but the seventh against them in all. The first was also the first in any ODI – by the Pakistan seamer Jalal-ud-Din when the Aussies visited Hyderabad in Sind in 1982-83. Then came Wasim Akram (for Pakistan in Sharjah in 1989-90), Jerome Taylor (for West Indies in Mumbai in 2006-07), Shane Bond (for New Zealand in Hobart in 2006-07), Lasith Malinga (for Sri Lanka in Colombo in August 2011), and most recently England’s Steven Finn, in Melbourne during the 2015 World Cup.There had been only two previous hat-tricks for India in ODIs, and none for more than 25 years. Chetan Sharma took the first, against New Zealand in Nagpur during the 1987 World Cup, and he was followed by Kapil Dev, against Sri Lanka in Calcutta in 1990-91.Which ground has staged the most Tests without anyone ever scoring a century or a double-century or a triple? asked Maneck Ghose from India

None of the 92 grounds which have staged more than one Test have failed to witness an individual century. But of the 22 which have held just one, there are four hundred-free zones: the Sector 16 Stadium in Chandigarh (the highest score was 88, by Ravi Shastri for India against Sri Lanka in 1990-91), the Southend (Defence) ground in Karachi (81, by Shoaib Mohammad for Pakistan v Zimbabwe in 1993-94), the Pindi Club in Rawalpindi (76, by Bruce Taylor for New Zealand v Pakistan in 1964-65), and the Jinnah Stadium in Gujranwala, where the highest score of Pakistan’s rain-affected Test against Sri Lanka in 1991-92 – only 36 overs were possible in the whole match – was Ramiz Raja’s undefeated 51.There has never been a double-century in 27 Tests at St George’s Park in Port Elizabeth, where the highest score remains Herschelle Gibbs’ 196 for South Africa against India in 2001-02. And the ground that has staged the most Tests without anyone managing a triple is Adelaide, with 75 – although there was an agonising near-miss there in 1931-32, when Don Bradman was left stranded on 299 against South Africa when the last man was run out.With Charlotte Edwards’ retirement last year, it is unlikely that anyone will break Jan Brittin’s record for most runs in women’s Tests•Getty ImagesI was surprised to read that Jan Brittin was still the leading scorer in women’s Tests. Is anyone close to her record? asked Derek Potter from England

Jan Brittin, who sadly died recently, remains the leading scorer in women’s Test matches with 1935 runs. Charlotte Edwards – who opened with Brittin on her Test debut in 1996 when only 16 – lies second with 1676, but has now retired. In all just ten women have reached 1000 runs in Test matches. This is down to the scarcity of such games – there have been only six in the current decade (three in 2014), and none at all since the one-off Ashes match in Canterbury in 2014, although one is scheduled for Sydney in November. It is difficult to see this situation changing much, given the current popularity of 20- and 50-over games, so Brittin’s record (and her five centuries, also the highest) may stand forever.Which player achieved the feat that narrowly eluded Don Bradman – ending his Test career with a 100-plus batting average? asked Chris Bloore from Hong Kong

The man who technically bettered Don Bradman’s famous Test batting average of 99.94 was the Trinidadian opener Andy Ganteaume, who scored 112 in his first innings for West Indies, against England in Port-of-Spain in 1947-48. He didn’t bat in the second innings, and remarkably never played again, so finished with a Test average of 112. Another player who, like the Don, just missed out was Sri Lanka’s Naveed Nawaz, whose sole Test came against Bangladesh in Colombo in 2002. He scored 21 and 78 not out, finishing with an average of 99.If you impose a qualification of 15 innings then the next best Test average after Bradman’s is 65.72, by New Zealand’s Stewie Dempster, who scored 723 runs in 15 innings, four of them not-out. Raise the bar to 20 innings and second place goes to Adam Voges, who recently retired from Test cricket: he made 1485 runs in 31 innings (seven not-outs) at an average of 61.87. Bradman himself had 80 innings (ten not-outs): the next best average from as many attempts as that is 60.73 by Herbert Sutcliffe (84 innings, seven not-outs, 4555 runs). The highest average by anyone who has batted more than 100 times in Tests is a current player: Steve Smith, with 59.66 (5370 runs).Leave your questions in the comments

Meet the rising star of T20 batting, a young West Indian with the potential to emulate the power-hitting of his team-mate, Chris Gayle

Tim Wigmore15-Sep-2017A few weeks ago, Evin Lewis did something that few batsmen have managed in the history of T20 cricket: he relegated Chris Gayle to inconsequential supporting act. The pair opened together for St Kitts and Nevis Patriots against the Barbados Tridents, chasing 129 to win. They got there in seven overs, powered by Lewis’s remarkable 97 not out off 32 balls – denied the chance of a century only by Kieron Pollard’s no-ball when the scores were level.Lewis laughs when I say that he outdid Gayle. “Yeah, yeah he told me the same thing. As I was striking the ball cleanly, he tried his best to give me the strike as much as possible. That’s something I feel really thankful for. Normally when a guy sees you going after the bowling he’ll try and go after the bowling too, but it was different with Chris.”It was not the first time that Lewis has usurped Gayle. Two months ago, Gayle returned to international cricket in his hometown of Jamaica, for a T20 international against India. A few hours later the talk was only of the Trinidadian Lewis. While Gayle stuttered to a rather awkward 18 off 20 balls, Lewis heaved 125 off 62 balls, with 12 sixes: the sort of innings that has marked him out as Gayle’s heir.That innings was Lewis’ second T20 international century, and second against India. The first came a year ago, in Florida. Lewis arrived assuming that he would be an unused squad member. “The coach came up to me that morning and said ‘Chris is out, you’re in’,” he recalls. “I was so nervous but I said ‘what’s the worst that could happen?’ So I just went out, was positive and got a good start. I felt free and started to hit the ball very cleanly.”By the time he was done, Lewis had scored 100 in 49 balls; both his T20I centuries have come at a strike rate in excess of 200. He and Gayle now form two-thirds of an elite club – Brendon McCullum is the other member – to have scored two T20I centuries.”Everybody keeps calling me the young Chris Gayle,” he chuckles. “I think I’m similar to how he bats. We work on a regular basis – almost every time together in the nets. He keeps talking to me, telling me to keep being myself, keep being positive, and keep doing my thing. In the wicket it’s the same – he always tells me to keep my shape when I go after the bowling. He’s a guy who’s really helped me in my cricket so far.”Lewis is a couple of inches shorter than Gayle, but shares his power and meticulous focus on hitting sixes. Both left-handed openers embrace an all-or-nothing trade-off, permitting a high percentage of dot-balls, while gluttonously reaping boundaries. Like Gayle, Lewis tends to eschew dabs behind the wicket, trusting instead in his own raw strength and timing. Full balls are lashed straight; those short of a length are heaved over the leg side, often through square leg; anything short is pulled with impunity.Perhaps we should not be asking whether Lewis will one day dethrone Gayle, but whether he already has. Consider their records opening together in this year’s Caribbean Premier League. Gayle scored five more runs in the tournament, and with four more not-outs was more consistent. But Lewis made his tempo look almost funereal: Gayle’s strike rate was 127.02; Lewis’s was 184.57. Gayle hit a boundary every 6.3 balls; Lewis hit one every 3.4 – and, unlike Gayle, more of those boundaries were sixes than fours.”He seems to have the all-round game and generally attacks from ball one, whereas Chris sometimes needs to face a few balls to get his eye in,” observes Trevor Penney, a coach at St Kitts and Nevis Patriots. Across T20 since the start of 2016, Lewis scores at 8.92 runs an over in the Powerplay, Gayle at a more sedate 7.74 runs an over.Evin Lewis creams one over the off side•Ashley Allen – CPL T20 / Getty”Once I know I can hit a ball for six, I’ll hit it for six. It can be the first ball,” Lewis explains. “I always back my strength. Certain balls I know, when it’s in my arc, I know I can hit it out the ground. Sometimes the good balls also go for six – that’s how the game is. When you’re on point, you’re on point.”To Lewis, bowlers are not opponents to fret over; they exist to give him something to hit. “I’m a destructive batsman – a batsman who goes out to be myself and be positive. I don’t worry about any name. If a big bowler or a bowler who’s really established bowls a short ball or a half volley, it’s the same half volley. That’s how I see it.”Lewis might have been lost to cricket. As a child, he preferred football, and “used to run from the ball” when batting. “But my dad told me that cricket is a better sport, especially in the country you live in – footballers don’t really reach as far as cricketers. So I just stuck to that.”The young Lewis idolised two cricketers: his compatriot Brian Lara, and Gayle. “Growing up, you don’t really have most of the technique, and most of the knowledge about cricket. Once you see the ball you just swing as hard as possible to see how far you can hit the ball. It just happens.” It was optimal grounding for the T20 age. “I have a special talent in me to hit sixes, so I just keep working on it every time I go out to bat, try and work on my strengths and also my weaknesses.”Such belligerence will surely lead to a gallivanting T20 career. Lewis has already played in the Bangladesh Premier League, where he will return in November, and has designs on other leagues too. “I might end up in the Big Bash and PSL and hopefully next year, please God, the IPL.”The question seems not whether Lewis’ talents will be seen throughout the world in the coming years, but if this will be confined to T20, with some one-day internationals throw in, or will extend to Tests too. Penney is convinced that Lewis can replicate David Warner’s journey from T20 into a successful Test cricketer: “He would flourish because he has a sound technique.”Lewis is elusive on Test cricket. “I won’t say I don’t want to play. Actually, if I do get the opportunity I would be interested but you know how things go sometimes. So let’s wait for the right moment to see what happens.”Yet although he is only 25, T20 careers rapidly gain their own momentum; if Lewis wants to play Tests too, he will have to make a conscious choice to focus more on his red-ball game. Perhaps, paradoxically, T20 specialisation will prove the most enduring difference with Gayle’s career. Gayle, for all his embrace of the T20 life, has played 103 Tests (and scored two triple-centuries).Either way, Lewis’s aim is not to be seen as merely Gayle’s protege. “I want to create my own image. I don’t really want to be under Chris Gayle. I want to be myself and make myself proud.” And so Lewis already has his eyes set on usurping Gayle once again, this time by stealing his record for the world’s quickest T20 century, set in just 30 balls.”The first record I was thinking of breaking was to score the fastest hundred in T20 cricket. That’s one record I’m really looking forward to.”

Running between two cones: how hard can it be?

Nagraj Gollapudi03-Dec-2017In October last year, Suresh Raina was picked for India’s home ODI series against New Zealand. He took a late-evening flight from Delhi to Bangalore, where he was headed to the National Cricket Academy. He had just played a Ranji Trophy match for Uttar Pradesh but hadn’t batted in the second innings because he wasn’t fully fit.The next morning he took a yo-yo test at the academy, and flunked it, failing to reach the minimum level set as a mandatory criterion by the Indian team management for a player to qualify for selection.Raina missed the first two ODIs, and he was told that once fit, he would need to take the test again. He did but failed once again to attain the 16:1 mark, the minimum level set for Indian players by the team’s strength and conditioning coach, Shankar Basu.Raina was the first big-name player to have failed the test since it came into effect in mid-2016, when Anil Kumble took over as India coach. Soon he was joined in that dubious achievement by Yuvraj Singh.The test
A yo-yo test involves a player shuttling between two cones that are set 20 metres apart on flat ground. He starts on a beep and needs to get to the cone at the other end before the second beep goes. He then turns back and returns to the starting cone before the third beep. That is one “shuttle”.A player starts at speed level 5, which consists of one shuttle. The next speed level, which is 9, also consists of one shuttle. Speed level 11, the next step up, has two shuttles, while level 12 has three and level 13 four. There are eight shuttles per level from 14 upwards. Level 23 is the highest speed level in a yo-yo test, but no one has come close to getting there yet. Each shuttle covers a distance of 40 metres, and the accumulated distance is an aggregate of distance covered at every speed level.The player gets ten seconds to recover between shuttles. At any point if he fails to reach the cone before the beep goes, he gets a first warning. Usually a player gets a few “reminders” to keep to the pace, but three official warnings generally marks the end of the test.As a player moves up the levels, the time available to complete each shuttle diminishes, which means he needs to run quicker to reach the next cone before the beep. The player runs until he gets his three warnings, and the level achieved at that point is the test result.Teams have different speed levels as qualifying marks. India have set 16:1 as the qualifying speed level, which means it is mandatory for their players to finish the first shuttle of speed level 16, which in terms of accumulated distance is 1120 metres. Pakistan’s minimum level is now 17:4; West Indies are at 19, and New Zealand probably have the highest level, 20:1.ESPNcricinfo LtdAs for “civilians”, the simplest way to know if you are fit for a yo-yo test is to run two kilometres in eight minutes.Why do cricketers need it?
The yo-yo test is mainly derived from the Leger Test, created by Luc Leger of the University of Montreal, which was popular till the turn of the century. The Leger multi-stage test, where an athlete would run non-stop 20-metre shuttles for 12 minutes, was not considered suitable for sports like cricket, which are marked by bursts of activity separated by recovery periods.”You bowl, you throw, you hit, you run, you have about 30 seconds before the next ball starts,” Andrew Leipus, who was till recently the head physiotherapist at the NCA, says. “So you’ve got to get your heart rate down, your breathing rate down for the next delivery.”Leipus says that the yo-yo test is not simply a fitness test, in that it also helps players improve their fitness while testing it. He used it as such when he doubled up as strength and conditioning coach at the Darren Lehmann Cricket Academy in Adelaide earlier this decade. “I used to actually run it back to back after 10-15 minutes’ recovery time. Alternatively, I would get the players running at a set level.”The intention behind the yo-yo tests and the “beep tests” of old (similar to the Leger tests, where a player shuttles between cones without taking breaks), Leipus says, was and is to establish a “baseline fitness”, showing the players were fitter than the common man. “It is going to mean less injuries because the guys are fitter. It is going to mean high level of performance, because guys are going to recover better out on the field. The turnaround time between matches is shorter now, so they are going to recover quick between games.”Also, once a player gets into shape to routinely pass the yo-yo test, Leipus says, “he will find it will improve his batting ability, because you recover better between runs running ones, twos, threes”.A yo-yo test also helps measure the aerobic capacity of a player. “We use it to show them how fit they are,” Chris Donaldson, the New Zealand strength and conditioning coach, says. “The major physical components of cricket are based around aerobics, strength, speed, so how fit, fast and strong they are are the components we train for a cricketer so that they don’t break. This way, they can play the game for longer and faster and they can do things like stop the ball, take a miracle catch or run between wickets faster.”“Like level 15 on a treadmill”
Fitness was high on Kumble’s list of priorities when he took over as India coach in June 2016, and he found backing from Virat Kohli, the captain, and senior players like MS Dhoni, who supported the idea of making passing the yo-yo test a requirement for selection. Basu was asked to come up with benchmarks that players needed to be able to reach playing at the international level.It is not only in India that the yo-yo test is mandatory. Umar Akmal was sent back home from England on the eve of the Champions Trophy this summer after he failed to attain 17:1, the PCB’s qualifying mark at the time. Reportedly, Akmal could only get to 16:5.Yo-yo tests help players recover faster between games•Getty ImagesSince then, Grant Luden, the Pakistan strength and conditioning coach, has raised the mark to 17:4, to motivate the players, he says. “The reason why we have come up with 17:4 is, it is not going to make you hit a cover drive or bowl faster. All it does is, it helps with the recovery.” Luden says that research shows that if a player plays three matches in a week, he has the ability to not just show consistent performances but also recover a lot faster.Luden arrived at 17:1 after sustained testing, from which he calculated averages: 17:1 was where his players showed consistent performances. “With us continually doing yo-yo testing, the standard of players started improving. That is how we moved up to 17.4.” Doing a 17:4 is the equivalent of running 1580 metres, which is a touch under four times around the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore.Luden says that if a player who has never taken a yo-yo test is able to shuttle for 20 minutes around a cricket oval at about 16-17kph, he will be able to pass the test without breaking too much of a sweat. “That is like level 15 on a treadmill, and you have got to be able to do that for ten minutes. If you can do that for ten minutes on a treadmill, you should pass.”Yo, champions
With a level of 20:1, New Zealand’s cricketers are probably the fittest in the sport. For good measure they have Donaldson, a former New Zealand Olympic sprinter, as their strength and conditioning coach.In New Zealand, all cricketers, international and domestic, are subject to yo-yo testing. Like Luden, Donaldson too arrived at 20:1 based on the average scores of New Zealand players. Passing a yo-yo test is not a prerequisite for selection in New Zealand, however.Still, the best New Zealand players, Donaldson reveals, have gone past 22. Not that that means they line up for the test. “They always dread it,” he says. “They are always a bit scared of it, probably because they want to do well. It is a tough test because you push yourself to the absolute limit to know where you are at.”What is Donaldson’s own level? “I have never done it,” he admits with a chuckle. “Thankfully it wasn’t around when I was running. Too hard.”Where and when you take the test matters
While it is obvious that players coming off long flights or returning after injury breaks will struggle more often than not in a yo-yo test, players who have been on the field frequently in the days leading up to a test also find it tough going.This September, Raina was again asked to take a yo-yo test. Once again, it came on the back of a busy schedule: he had played two Duleep Trophy matches when he flew to Bangalore to take the test. He failed again.5:39

ESPNcricinfo staffers take a crack at the yo-yo test

Ramji Srinivasan, one of the most senior trainers in India, a former strength and conditioning coach for India, and currently in that role for the Tamil Nadu side, says players need to be given time to prepare. “Players should also be allowed to appeal and redo the testing in ten days,” he says. “They should be allowed to prepare physically and mentally for the testing.”The case of Tamil Nadu offspinner Washington Sundar illustrates his point. Ahead of selection of the squad for the New Zealand T20 series in October this year, Sundar was summoned to Bangalore for a yo-yo test in the middle of what had been a busy domestic season for him.He was in Lucknow, playing for India Red in the Duleep Trophy final, when the call came. He had got there from Dehradun, where he was at a preparatory camp for the Ranji Trophy, only a few days earlier.Sundar, who had never taken the test, took it immediately after the Duleep Trophy final. He missed the qualifying mark narrowly, getting to level 16, and missed out on selection for the New Zealand series.He was clearly disappointed and did not hide it. “The next day I came back home and I woke up and saw in the newspapers that I flunked the fitness tests,” Sundar told the media after hitting a century at the start of the Ranji season. “Nobody [from the management] spoke to me. I got to know the results later and did not get to know there on the same day from them.”Leipus agrees with Srinivasan that preparation time is important. “The test is both mental and physical. If you have not done it before, you don’t know what to expect. There is the pacing element because the speed of the test increases as the time goes on. So you are going to probably going to go too hard too soon, as opposed to pacing yourself.”A couple of important factors that can influence the final reading are the surface the player undergoes the test on and the weather. The surface is significant due to the traction available, since the ability to pivot quickly is an important element. Turning on a natural surface like grass outdoors is not like doing so on, say, rubber matting laid over concrete indoors (as is the case at the NCA).Leipus says that the fact that the ambient temperature is more stable indoors helps with consistency in the players’ levels. “But if the variables change outdoors and if it is very hot, you will obviously be fatigued a lot quicker and the numbers will be pretty low.”Numbers aren’t everything, or at least they shouldn’t be
All the strength and conditioning coaches agree that age does not normally have much of a bearing on the results of yo-yo tests. Misbah-ul-Haq, Luden says, got to 18:5 without any fuss in his farewell series, at the age of 42. Ashish Nehra, who retired at 39 recently, clocked 18:4 during a yo-yo test earlier this year – reportedly better even than the likes of Virat Kohli at the time. Ravindra Jadeja, India’s best fieldsman, reportedly clocked 16:1, and it is understood that Manish Pandey has set the Indian benchmark, with 19:1.Ashish Nehra, at 39, was doing better at yo-yo tests than his younger team-mates, having been an enthusiastic runner earlier in his career•AFP/Getty ImagesESPNcricinfo understands that the minimum qualification for the Indian team is to be to raised to 17 soon. According to Leipus, a major drawback of having one standard to reach is, it is not individualised. “And that is where some guys are going to be at disadvantage.” Leipus and Srinivasan also agree that fitness quotient and cricketing ability are and should remain distinct. “For example, Yuvraj has had cancer, so he has reduced lung capacity, based on the treatment he received. So that is obviously going to affect his running performance in a yo-yo test, but that is not going to directly affect his cricket ability,” Leipus says. “You are going to have to make those exceptions.”Indeed, there always have been exceptions. Nehra remembers: “[Sachin Tendulkar] would say: ‘How many runs do I have to run?’ Four. So his test was to run four in minimum time. Sachin was always quick between the wickets, even at 39.”According to Leipus, injury management is also a factor. “We never used to make Sachin do them back in the day because of his broken toe. You don’t want to exacerbate injuries just for the sake of the getting a number. Yes, these benchmarks are really important, but then you do have to take them on a case-by-case basis – when the players are more established, have had some significant injuries and you have to modify your expectations somewhat.”Does fitness equal success?
Has the yo-yo test made a difference to the Indian team on the field? A BCCI official says the impact of the test is evident in the improving standards of Indian players. “Any player who covers 20 metres in less than three seconds it is hugely helpful,” he says. “It helps the fielders pursue and grab difficult catches on the boundary line. Say a guy whose level is 15, and if there is a catch that is about 15 metres away, he might just get his fingertips to it. But somebody who covers 20 metres in 2.8 or 2.9 seconds, for him the same catch will be easy.Leipus points out that the yo-yo test favours batsmen, as it emphasises the physiological and biomechanical demands of batting more than it does those of running in “linearly” for the bowlers. But he adds that players needn’t be distracted by specific pros and cons. “For an elite athlete whose job is effort-recovery, whether you are a batsman or a bowler, the yo-yo test mimics that quite well. So I do not think it is unreasonable to have that as the [minimum] level.”Kumble is no more the India coach, but his fitness-first mindset is alive and strong. Kohli, for one, is uncompromising on fitness too.”If there is one player who is putting on too much body weight, who is not doing the training, he can bring the team down. He is not being the best he can be for the team,” Leipus says. “And Virat does not want that type of thinking to come into the squad. I have been waiting for this for 15 years. It is fantastic they are doing it now to change the culture.”As Nehra says, though, only a player can push his own boundaries. “When it comes to running, you have to push yourself. Virat Kohli has not become a fit athlete overnight. He has worked hard on his fitness for the last three years and that is why he is successful.”

What happened when the greatest concentration of convicted ball-tamperers ever seen on this planet descended upon Colombo? Andrew Fidel Fernando investigates

Andrew Fidel Fernando10-Jul-20184:17

How sweets help alter the condition of the ball

It happened and we all missed it. They were together, but what were we doing? Too busy with our own vapid lives to notice. It was only for a few days, but through the back end of last week: Dinesh Chandimal, Faf du Plessis, Vernon Philander, and Dasun Shanaka were all within 10 kilometres of each other. Meaning, of course, that little old Colombo, with its tree-lined lanes, and bougainvilleas tumbling over garden walls, was home – if you can believe it – to the greatest concentration of convicted ball-tamperers ever seen on this planet.What was it like? We can only imagine. Did these four men, bound eternally by clause 41.3 of the ICC’s Test Match Playing Conditions, get together to share and sympathise? Might they have retired to a corner of one of those dim-lit Colombo restaurants, ordered up a round of ginger beers, and over a plate of devilled prawns, traded notes?It is easy to see Chandimal and du Plessis bonding over their shared enthusiasm for sweets.”You’ve got it backwards, Faf. It’s strepsils on the Kookaburra and mints on the Dukes.””The real trick, Chandi, is to put it into your mouth well you get the ball in hand.”And what of the fingernail bros, Philander and Shanaka? Do they lean towards a certain brand of nail clipper? Could they, if they put their heads together, design an altogether more elegant and effective methodology? Maybe spark a revolution in the craft?If you are a lawyer employed by any of these gentlemen you can stop reading here, because I apologise profusely and unreservedly, and will absolutely stop making fun the moment I get through these next couple of gags.But it seems to me that these men, and cricketers like them across the planet, can feel a little aggrieved at what has happened to the tampering practice over the last few months. Ever since Australia unleashed their uncouth iteration on the planet, crassly using a building material to change the condition of the ball when one’s own bodily fluids has sufficed for generations of purists, tampering has become a crime out of step with its actual impact on the game. Before sandpapergate, no player had ever been suspended for a Test over the offence. Now, the ICC has made it punishable by a ban of up to six Tests, or 12 limited-overs matches.Dinesh Chandimal has a chat with head coach Chandika Hathurusingha•RANDY BROOKS/AFP/Getty ImagesIt is not as if it had been this great a blight on cricket. There have been only eight cases of convicted tampering in the last 12 years, du Plessis bossing the leaderboard, having committed one quarter of those offences. Beyond the incidents that were caught on camera, there have been few accusations of tampering, even though reverse swing plays a role in the majority of Tests played.On top of which even if players are attempting to change the condition of the ball, they don’t seem to be particularly successful at it. The ball was inspected at Newlands, but remained unchanged after Cameron Bancroft had had his way with it – the umpires stating that it remained suitable for play. At St. Lucia, where the most-recent case of tampering emerged, umpires allowed Sri Lanka to continue bowling with a supposedly tampered ball, and only changed it after viewing incriminating footage the following morning. All this suggests that even after umpires have stared intently at a ball, tossed it around, passed it through their circular moulds, and stared some more (no umpire yet has taken to publicly tasting a ball to check for residue of sugary saliva), they can’t consistently pick a tampered ball out of a line-up.Ironic though du Plessis’ comments about increasing sanctions for tampering were, his concerns regarding the enforcement of those sanctions are worth considering. “The ICC has made the penalties a lot more strict, but they still haven’t said what is allowed and what isn’t allowed,” he said ahead of this series. “Is chewing gum allowed? Is it not? Are you allowed mints in your mouth?” In addition: How long after having had a sweet in the mouth can someone apply saliva to it? Or can players no longer take these substances on to the field at all?There is also no science to show that sugary saliva can even actually grant a bowling team an unfair advantage; all evidence, for now, is completely anecdotal. In ratcheting up the punishments, ICC has reacted swiftly to the outrage over sandpapergate – outrage that was more the result of decades of abrasive behaviour from the Australia side, than the act of tampering itself. Signs from the ICC are that tampering will continue to be policed largely based on the outrage it is capable of generating, with broadcasters heavily relied upon to first notice acts of tampering, then bring such footage to the match officials’ notice.Meanwhile, the likes of du Plessis, Chandimal and Philander are left to ponder what exactly tampering entails.