ICC biomechanical expert says.....

Murali was right
 

BY SA'ADI Thawfeeq

THE International Cricket Council's (ICC) biomechanical expert Dr. Paul Hurrion said that Sri Lanka spin king Muttiah Muralitharan was right in going for technology to clear his name after he was called for chucking in a Test match in Australia.

"Technology was first brought in when Murali became the first big case in 1995/96 where people were suspect of his particular bowling action," said Dr Hurrion in an exclusive interview with the 'Daily News.'

Dr. Hurrion's representative in Sri Lanka Shiran Anthony of Classic Worldwide Trade said that he is here at the invitation of the Fingara Club to introduce his performance analysis and biomechanical software at the inauguration of the Fingara Cricket Academy today.

"Murali was always under the microscope and he wanted to use the technology that was available to help clear his name. If you believe you are innocent you would do everything in your power to try and come out clean," said Dr. Hurrion.

"That's how it all started and it's carried forward. It is not just him now but a number of other bowlers have benefited by it."

Muralitharan was first called for throwing by Australian umpire Darrel Hair in a Test match against Australia at Melbourne in 1995 and then again four years later in a one-day international by another Australian umpire Ross Emerson. ICC match referee Chris Broad as recent as last year also reported him on his new delivery, the 'doosra', which went the other way.

The controversy surrounding Muralitharan's doosra delivery brought forth a great deal of research. Dr Hurrion who set the previous levels of tolerance for bowlers at 10 degrees for fast bowlers, 7.5 degrees for medium pacers and 5 degrees for spinners were asked by the ICC to review it and to arrive at one figure, which was applicable to all bowlers.

"Fifteen degrees was arrived at by the ICC panel which comprised myself, Bruce Elliott and Mark Portus (the other two biomechanical experts). It took us a long time to come to that figure. A lot of heaty discussions took place," said Dr Hurrion.

"When the panel met in Dubai last year, we put all the available data forward. The ICC has done a very thorough job and the new protocols that we have got in place at the moment are very solid."

Thank to technology Muralitharan still continues to play international cricket. He is the second highest wicket-taker in Test cricket with 532 wickets.

Dr. Hurrion said that the human eye only works at 15 frames per second and cannot grasp anything that takes place faster than that.

"We've done a lot of research and we found that bowlers who are under 15 the human eye doesn't notice when you watch it at full speed purely because the human brain can't work as quickly as a high speed camera," said Dr. Hurrion.

"Under 15 framed bowlers look fine. It it is when they get above that 15 mark a little question mark comes in and they say: 'that didn't look quite right or quite normal'," he said.

"The problems are when you have somebody bowling around 14, 15 or 16 degrees. When fatigue sets in or he has been hit for four on the previous delivery all these sort of factors creep in."

Dr. Hurrion said that bowlers could be cleared as a result of laboratory testing, but that doesn't give the bowler a carte blanche to go and throw in the next game because he could still be easily called.

"The bowlers are tested in laboratory conditions for accuracy. That's really fundamental. We have 4-5 cameras all filming at 200-250 frames per second. It will be very important to replicate what they do in the game as to what they do in lab conditions. We can try with run ups and speeded deliveries and the amount of turn. We can't get any closer to a match situation," explained Dr. Hurrion.

"We've seen some of the old footage of bowlers and it doesn't look very good. Even the old clips we can drop that down to 50 frames per second. Harold Larwood (of Bodyline fame) looks a little suspect. Charlie Griffith was another one.

I don't want to single anybody out, but there are certainly past players when you put under slow motion do look a little bit suspect," he said. "In the past bowlers got away with throwing because the technology was not available as it is today.

Technology in sport science is coming into every discipline. Sport today is big business. With money you are always looking for the edge. Money breeds people who look for different avenues to try and improve their performance. If technology can help give your team gain an advantage why not use it?" asked Dr. Hurrion.

To those past cricketers who still cannot grasp technology and accept the 15-degree rule and criticize it at every opportunity, Dr. Hurrion said: "I would challenge anyone who criticizes the 15 degree rule to come and have a look at the high speed camera, the footage and the angles.

The camera doesn't lie and the computer data doesn't lie. That's what basically biomechanics is. It can analyse any movement. Technique is biomechanics in a nutshell. It's a new buzz word."