NEIL MANTHORP, Hove | Wednesday 1.00p m.
SOUTH Africa’s top two fast bowlers, Allan Donald and Shaun Pollock, believe the World Cup will not be dominated by seam bowlers to the extent that many players have predicted — and the reason is the seam itself.
Speaking after the team’s first practice session in Hove on Tuesday, both men said they were convinced that the Dukes ball to be used in the tournament had been altered in design and was now held together with a smaller seam than in the past.
”It is definitely a bit smaller and quite different from all the other Dukes balls I’ve ever seen. I think they might have done it to get higher-scoring games because there has been some criticism of the ball in the early stages of a game,” Donald said.
The South African team usually play with the Australian-made Kookaburra ball, which has a smaller seam than the English-made Dukes ball, but in the seven one-day matches against the West Indies earlier this year they used the Dukes ball as practice for the World Cup.
”Also the weather in the early part of the season means there’ll be moisture in the pitches to give the seamers even more assistance. Certainly when we played the West Indies it was darting all over the place off the seam, which is probably why they changed it,” Donald said.
Pollock brought a new Dukes ball from that series in South Africa with him to England and compared it with the new balls the team were given to practise with in Hove.
”You can see the difference quite clearly. They’ve definitely flattened the seam and I’m also not sure that there is as much lacquer on the ball as there used to be, which means it won’t swing as much as it used to.
South African coach Bob Woolmer agreed that the ball looked significantly different. ”The seam is much flatter. There was concern and some adverse comment on the size of the seam before so maybe they’ve taken the decision to reduce it,” Woolmer said.
Managing Director of Dukes, Dilip Jajodia, admitted from the company’s headquarters in Canterbury that the World Cup ball was different but denied that the change had been made specifically for the tournament.
Woolmer said teams might be compelled to change tactics if the ball seamed and swung less than they were expecting and pinch hitters might be used with teams making higher scores than they were previously aiming at.
Meanwhile the first fullscale practice outing at Hove on Tuesday revealed a couple of unexpected injuries during Monday’s light run-around at the ground.
Seamer Steve Elworthy is nursing a bruised right calf muscle to compound his Duke worries, offspinner Derek Crookes a sprained right index finger and Jonty Rhodes sports a sore wrist.
Rhodes’ problem is a legacy of some over-exuberant rowing during the squad’s recent stay in Swellendam but Elworthy and Crookes are both victims of Monday’s touch rugby session.
Elworthy ran into a ”tackle” by assistant coach Corrie van Zyl while Crookes damaged his finger in attempting a desperate intercept. — Reuters