Allan Donald should have been 'no-balled, cautioned and not allowed to bowl for the rest of the innings' for his 'fast, short-pitched bowling' to Mike Atherton and Nasser Hussain on the Sunday evening at Trent Bridge.
Law 42.8 Unfair Play is quite specific on the subject. Such bowling is unfair ``if it constitutes an attempt to intimidate the striker''. What, you may ask? Intimidate flint-eyed Atherton. Don't make me laugh. Might as well try to intimidate a tiger with a pea-shooter.
But the law is considerably modified by a playing condition which avoids the intimidation issue and concentrates on the threat of personal injury, ie: 'the bowling of fast short-pitched balls is unfair if by their repetition and taking into account their length, height and direction, they are likely to inflict physical injury on the striker, irrespective of the protective clothing and equipment he may be wearing.'
Intimidated or not, I dare say the England batsmen were sporting a fair few bruises and why on earth would they be jerking and wrenching their heads out of the path of the ball if there was no likelihood of physical injury? I rest my case.
What prompted me more than anything to raise this unpopular issue at a time when the euphoria surrounding England's victory is still all aglow, was the lack of balance among other critics and the extreme confrontational language used to describe what was obviously an exciting half-hour of Test cricket.
Ex-England captain David Gower used the words ``going-over'' and ``working over'', comparing this particular attack on Atherton's person with a similar occasion at Sabina Park when Courtney Walsh was the aggressor. They are indeed extremely descriptive, even if they are more suitable to the boxing ring or football hooligan brawls. Not a word, nor a hint that there was such a thing as 'unfair play'.
On both occasions the bowlers decided to bowl round the wicket having failed to win the battle from the more orthodox angle. Now you do not have to be a technical genius to know that the main purpose of going round is to narrow the angle and make it more difficult for the batsman to avoid the bouncers. The only justification is to increase the chances of a slip catch, while forsaking any idea of hitting the stumps or gaining an lbw
So why did the umpires not intervene? Was it because they were already under pressure from a couple of dodgy decisions? Or is Law 42.8 and the playing condition temporarily suspended by common consent of the players, umpires and officials at Test level? Surely it is untenable to wait until actual injury occurs before starting to apply the sanction.
The annoying part is that rather than being some kind of a kill-joy, the umpire could in fact add to the tension of the moment by applying the law strictly. The bowler gets not just one, but two warnings before not being allowed to bowl again in the innings. Imagine the scene with the bowler legitimately pushing his luck as far as possible but finally pulling back from the brink.
It is tempting to condone these hot-tempered interludes, especially in the light of typical after match comments by Atherton along the lines that it was all good clean fun and ended up with a glass of beer together in the evening. But should we really be so gullible as to take these platitudes at face value?
It is obvious that the batsman has to follow this line of response. If he complains in the very least or even hints that he should have been offered some protection by the umpires, he has immediately lost half the psychological battle with the bowler he is going to have to face next week and the week after. You only have to see the way a fast bowler raises his pace when one of the known weaker players comes in to know that an inch given either verbally or by body language means an extra yard on the ball coming the other way.
The inherent weakness in the basic law is this. Imagine a somewhat overweight and ageing fast bowler having a last desperate fling to try to win a game or to maintain his place in the team for a little longer. He knows all the tricks and goes round the wicket for a spot of intimidation. But he has lost his pace. The batsman not only copes easily but scores heavily.
At the other end his younger and far fitter partner decides that he will mount the same kind of attack. He bowls exactly the same line and length as the senior man but with far more menace and immediately gets warned off by the umpires. Now that is palpably unfair and is the reason for the change of emphasis for first-class cricket and for Test matches. The law itself will possibly be modified and brought into line.
The reason for keeping some kind of check on what is basically an attack on the body rather than aiming at the stumps is the fear that variety could go out of the game if the balance of advantage is allowed to rest with fast bowling as opposed to spin and accurate swing. The West Indian four fast bowler winning system of the Seventies was a warning which should be heeded.