Sachin Tendulkar and Waqar Younis question the two-new ball rule in ODI cricket

To say that the ongoing England vs Australia ODI series has been high-scoring would still be an understatement. The hosts lead the five-match series 4-0 and in the four matches thus far – England have scored 1355 runs and Australia have managed 1067 runs. So the average score for the Brits in this series has been 338 which means life has been quite difficult for the bowlers. Former Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar emphasised on the same point and expressed his concern.

He thinks the fact that there are two new balls in use from both ends is a recipe for disaster. The ball never gets old enough to reverse swing and thus the bowlers don’t have a lot of hope to make it move in the death overs. Reverse swing is something that ensured there was an equal contest between bat and ball in the last few overs as the batters still had to deal with lateral movement and not just think about whacking the ball.

One of the pioneers and a real exponent of reverse swing Waqar Younis agreed with Sachin on this point and said that it was because of this we haven’t seen a lot of attacking fast bowlers evolve in the game. The bowlers are always concerned about stopping the batsmen and use change in pace more than trying to dismissing them. He also affirmed that reverse swing has almost vanished from white-ball cricket.

Sachin and Waqar’s tweets:

Sachin in his tweet wrote- “Having 2 new balls in one day cricket is a perfect recipe for disaster as each ball is not given the time to get old enough to reverse. We haven’t seen reverse swing, an integral part of the death overs, for a long time. #ENGvsAUS”

Waqar quoted it and added- “Reason why we don’t produce many attacking fast bowlers..They all very defensive in their approach…always looking for change ups..totally agree with you @sachin_rt reverse swing is almost vanished.. #SAD”

Having 2 new balls in one day cricket is a perfect recipe for disaster as each ball is not given the time to get old enough to reverse. We haven’t seen reverse swing, an integral part of the death overs, for a long time. #ENGvsAUS

— Sachin Tendulkar (@sachin_rt) June 21, 2018

Reason why we don’t produce many attacking fast bowlers..They all very defensive in their approach…always looking for change ups..totally agree with you @sachin_rt reverse swing is almost vanished.. #SAD https://t.co/hPHoMXujcr

— Waqar Younis (@waqyounis99) June 21, 2018

New Zealander Mitchell McClenaghan also replied to Sachin’s tweet and wrote there is no better way the concern could be expressed.

Could it be said any better? – don’t think so! 👏👏👏

— Mitchell McClenaghan (@Mitch_Savage) June 22, 2018

England vs Australia ODI series

The first ODI of the series was a quiet affair as the Aussies batted first and all they could manage was 214 runs. England chased it down comfortably with three wickets and 6 overs to spare. At Old Trafford, Eoin Morgan’s team walked out to post a first innings total and they banged 342 runs in 50 overs at the cost of 8 wickets. Australia in their response fell 38 runs short of the target and were bowled out in 47.1 overs.

The third match of the series at Nottingham was a must-win for the visitors as England could otherwise seal the series. Batting first the Brits were at some other level altogether. A total of 481/6 in 50 overs bettered the previous world record for the highest ODI team total and they won the match by a gigantic margin of 242 runs. With that, also the series 3-0. More than anything else it was a nightmare of a game for the bowlers.

In the fourth and most recent ODI at Chester-le-Street, Tim Paine’s team was out batting first they struggled for a bit but still put together 310 runs for the loss of 8 wickets. If it seemed like a good enough total at the halfway stage it wasn’t. The English batters chased it down in 44.4 overs with 6 wickets in hand.

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