Waqar, Tendulkar urge two-ball rethink

NEW DELHI: Indian and Pakistani legends Sachin Tendulkar and Waqar Younis Friday joined calls to scrap the practice of using two new balls in One-Day International cricket following a string of mammoth scores.

Tendulkar, the highest scoring batsman of all time, who retired in 2013, tweeted that having two balls in each innings “is a perfect recipe for disaster as each ball is not given the time to get old enough to reverse (swing)”.

He added: “We haven’t seen reverse swing, an integral part of the death overs, for a long time.”Former Pakistan speedster Younis, a master of the reverse swing along with partner-in-crime Wasim Akram during their playing days, tweeted that he “totally agreed” with Tendulkar.

“Reason why we don’t produce many attacking fast bowlers..They all very defensive in their approach,” he said. “reverse swing is almost vanished..#SAD”.The comments came after England’s batsmen set a new ODI record this week with a huge 481-6 against Australia at Nottingham.

Then on Thursday, England chased down the visitors’ 310 — a more-than-respectable total in former days — with 32 balls and six wickets to spare.England’s total at Trent Bridge was the eighth score of 400 or more since the start of 2015.