The South African cricket team is all geared up for the upcoming tour of Sri Lanka for two Tests, five ODIs, and a T20I. While it will be a tough challenge for Faf du Plessis’ team on the spinning conditions. The hosts will also be looking forward to coming back strongly after the ball-tampering saga saw their skipper Dinesh Chandimal getting banned for the final Test of the series against the West Indies.
Du Plessis reckons that the International Cricket Council (ICC) need to announce harsher punishment for committing ball-tampering. Having himself been at the receiving end, he also added that there also needs to be clarity on what amounts to tampering as Faf reckons that there are too many grey areas when it comes to the issue and the rules of the international body.
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Talking about the issue further, the South African skipper said, “They have to (be stricter). It’s happening too often. They definitely need to do that as quickly as possible. I know they met a while ago but it doesn’t look like anything has changed. It’s still the same rules and stuff, so they need to change that. The penalties need to be harsher for ball tampering. I have probably said it too much but there are too many grey areas when it comes to the ICC and the rules.”
He further added, “One, you want clarity and, two, you want consistency and that’s definitely something that’s not been part of that body of laws for a while now. There’s a lot of captains that have been speaking about it for a lot of years so, hopefully, when they do bring in all these new things there will be a lot of clarity and, most importantly, consistency for all teams.”
Chandimal is expected to be pardoned by the Sri Lankan board as they said that n further sanctions will be implemented on him as Dinesh didn’t intentionally tamper the ball. Sports minister Faiszer Mustapha, who is currently supervising the functioning of Sri Lanka cricket, said that ICC’s penalties were sufficient but he was ‘disturbed’ by the team’s decision to delay play against West Indies in the St.Lucia Test.
