Friday, August 9, 2002 "What should you do when you win the toss?" the teacher asked the school captain. "Assess the conditions first, sir, and then think about the best option," suggested the captain. "No," explained the teacher, "when you win the toss you think about bowling, and always decide to decide to bat first."

Sound familiar? These words of wisdom have been offered to most budding cricketers. Perhaps Sourav Ganguly remembered them when he decided to expose his batsmen to a murky day at Trent Bridge. He certainly was not thinking of giving maximum advantage to his three-pronged pace attack. Nor did he have their welfare in mind - not if you believe the findings of a study in this month's British Journal of Sports Medicine, that is.

A team of researchers from Australia studied injuries in their domestic and international cricket over a three-year period, and found that the side batting first picked up more injuries. Dr John Orchard and his colleagues hypothesise that bowlers are better warmed up at the start of the match than they are in later innings. They advise an extended warm-up period before any innings to avoid bowling injuries.

Intuitively this makes sense, but this aspect of their study is suggestive rather than conclusive. More convincingly, they find that fast bowlers pick up most injuries, about five times more often than spinners. And, interestingly, bowlers who have bowled more than 20 overs in the week before a match have double the risk of injury. Not very surprising, you might say, but in the world of science there is a big difference between guesswork - however obvious - and good evidence. And despite the sea of statistics that surrounds cricket - runs, wickets, and catches - there is still little knowledge about cricket injuries.

The relevance of this research is that it supports the policy of central contracts and breaks from touring for fast bowlers. In fact, in terms of injuries, batsmen and wicketkeepers could play all year and it wouldn't matter much, although burnout is a separate consideration.

The ECB has had a rough ride with its introduction of central contracts, but it is a policy that is beginning to pay off for England, and they can now quote evidence that it might reduce injuries for their fast bowlers. It might have come too late for Darren Gough, though.

Pakistan are the latest to follow the trend for central contracts, and what is really needed is an even more careful approach to looking after fast bowlers. India have a history of flogging fast bowlers to a weary retirement. Kapil Dev only endured so long because of his supreme athleticism, while Javagal Srinath lost his potency too early. With Ashish Nehra and Zaheer Khan promising so much for the future, India must handle them with care. And bowling first at Trent Bridge might have helped too.

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Kamran Abbasi, born in Lahore, brought up in Rotherham, is deputy editor of the British Medical Journal.

More Kamran Abbasi
Talking the talk
Not such a green and pleasant land

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