The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Field umpires must call chuckers

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jun 13, 2006

Sport

Sport - Cricket

Field umpires must call chuckers

Special Correspondent

Gros Islet: West Indies off-spin great Lance Gibbs believes the way to eradicate chucking is for the umpires to act during the match. The 71-year-old told The Hindu that the embarrassment at being called would act as a deterrent.

"The umpires should be calling chuckers out on the field and not let it go to the ICC," he said. "If they call him in front of the public, everyone knows he is a chucker. Do you know the embarrassment it would cause? It should be done in the open, and not later in some room."

On the battle for supremacy between Shane Warne and Muttiah Muralitharan, the man with 309 wickets from 79 Tests said, "If you are playing at your prime and playing a lot of cricket, you will take a lot of wickets.

"I played 79 Tests in 18 years; now, I would have played over 200 in the same period. I never played against Bangladesh, Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka and South Africa. If you are in your prime, you really look forward to playing against the minnows."

Gibbs said no Indian spinner since Erapalli Prasanna, to his mind, had been successful outside India. "They don't put in enough, don't give the ball enough air," he said.

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