India vs Australia: ‘It annoys the hell out of me,’ Ian Chappell wants ICC to ban Glenn Maxwell’s switch hit
Chappell isn’t in the favour of this shot and believes that switch-hitting is unfair to the bowler and the fielding team. He has even called on the International Cricket Council (ICC) to ban them.
Shrugging off bitter memories of the IPL 2020, Australian all-rounder Glenn Maxwell is enjoying the purple patch in the ongoing ODI series against India. He has been phenomenal with the bat in the first two games, scoring 110 runs with two half-centuries.
Maxwell has taken up the responsibility in the middle-order pretty well and living up to the expectation of the team management. All this while, he has also unleashed a number of his trademark switch hits to humiliate the Indian bowlers.
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However, former Australian batsman Ian Chappell isn’t in the favour of this shot and believes that switch-hitting is unfair to the bowler and the fielding team. He has even called on the International Cricket Council (ICC) to ban them.
During a conversation with Wide World of Sports, Chappell said that it’s very annoying and extremely unfair when a batter becomes ‘opposite-handed’ and foils the fielding set by the opponent captain.
“The Australian batting has been exceptional. They’ve made it look pretty easy ... particularly Smith and Maxwell, some of the shots he plays are hard to believe. [Switch-hitting] is very skillful, some of its amazingly skillful - but it’s not fair,” Chappell was quoted as saying.
“How can one side of the game, i.e. the bowlers, they have to tell the umpire how they’re going to bowl. And yet the batsman, he lines up as a right-hander - I’m the fielding captain, I place the field for the right-hander - and before the ball’s been delivered, the batsman becomes a left-hander,” Ian Chappell said.
“If he’s good enough to do it by excellent footwork or whatever other means he can devise, I don’t have a problem with it. But when it’s blatantly unfair, it annoys the hell out of me,” he added.
Chappell asserted that the ICC should take action to outlaw the switch-hitting.
“It’s very simple. Maxwell hit a couple of [switch-hit] shots and Warner did [Sunday] night. All you’ve got to say is that if the batsman changes the order of his hands or his feet [as the bowler runs in], then it’s an illegal shot,” Chappell said.
