Not a big deal: Pat Cummins on permanent saliva ban

Australian Test captain Pat Cummins on the eve of the third Test against Pakistan has said that permanent ban on the use of saliva on cricket balls is not a big deal.

The tearaway fast bowler who has been in excellent form despite the batting friendly tracks in Pakistan stated that he didn’t think that it made drastic changes in terms of managing the ball. 

“I don’t think it has made a huge effect, as big as we might have thought it would. We still use sweat so it’s not too big a deal.”

Notably, the use of saliva was banned from all forms of cricket after the onset of the novel Coronavirus pandemic and later the guardians of the cricketing law, Marylebone Cricket Club found out in their investigation that saliva does not have much impact in ball management vis-a-vis the use of sweat.

Cummins’ Australia will be up against Pakistan for the third and final Test match starting Monday. The first two Test matches have been flat tracks with bowlers toiling for days on dead pitches. Australia tried their very best and worked tremendously as a unit to eke a result out of the second Test match, but were unable to eke out a result as Babar Azam stood tall and churned out a fantastic 196 in the final innings of the game.

This is Cummins’ final assignment for the national team before focus shifts to the Indian Premier League where he will be part of the core group for Kolkata Knight Riders.

When asked, Cummins spoke about how he got on well with Shreyas Iyer during his time in Delhi Capitals and that he was very excited to be playing for the Kolkata based franchise who are looking for their third IPL trophy after their loss in the finals last season.

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