Dawid Malan has advocated for legalising ball tampering to make closer finishes more likely in T20 matches.
I think it would make cricket a lot more bowler friendly: Dawid Malan on ball tampering
Speaking on the BBC's Strategic Timeout podcast, Malan promoted his idea for a radical change to the T20 rulebook when discussing Fakhar Zaman's recent ban for tampering with the ball in the PSL.
"I actually think you should legalise it," said Malan. "Just let people scratch the ball. Obviously, not bringing things in from outside but it's a skill in itself to be able to get the ball to reverse swing. I think it would make cricket a lot more bowler friendly towards the end if you could get the ball reversing, I think it would make games tighter towards the end and it would just be winning with six wickets in hand because the ball would be moving and hard to face."
Legalise ball tampering?!
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Dawid Malan has a radical suggestion to shake up cricket.
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The current laws of cricket prevent any player from taking an action which changes the condition of the ball beyond normal on-field duties. Players are permitted to polish the ball on their clothing, and use sweat to shine one side of it, remove mud from the ball and dry it under the supervision of an umpire.
Fakhar Zaman was banned for two PSL matches earlier this month, after a panel upheld the punishment imposed on him for altering the condition of the ball in Lahore Qalandars' game against Multan Sultans. Fakhar was shown on camera examining the ball with Haris Rauf and Shaheen Shah Afridi, before placing his hand over the top of the ball. The umpires then examined the ball and asked for it to be changed.
"If you can get the ball to move, it makes such a difference at the death," said Malan. "The death overs are the hardest to bowl – batters are so skilled now at hitting the ball miles, and your miss hits are going for sixes so if you can get any tactical advantage with the ball shaping a little bit or reverse swinging towards the end, you want to do what you can to do that.
"In the teams I played in the past, you're always trying to find ways to get the ball reversing. I'm not going to sit here and say that people haven't tried different things to get the ball reversing because they have. That's part of the game is you want that little advantage. If you look historically over the game, people have been caught trying to tamper with the ball for years, it's not a new thing."
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