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Titmus clears Harbajan's action

Fred Titmus has cleared India's 18-year-old off spinner Harbhajan Singh of allegations of chucking.

BCCI executive secretary Sharad Diwadkar, who accompanied Harbajan to Titmus' clinic in London for two days before returning to Mumbai on Thursday, said Titmus had found nothing wrong in Harbhajan's action.

The action required some minor correction which if followed will create no problems for the rest of his career, Diwadkar said, quoting Titmus, a former England off spinner.

Diwadkar said Titmus had pointed out that Harbajan was dropping his head towards the left, at the point of delivery, creating an impression that his delivery was illegal. All he had to do was keep the head straight and the arm will auotmatically appear straight, Titmus had observed, according to Diwadkar.

Harbhajan was tested for four hours, two days on the run, with a video camera in front of him and another sideways. He was very much relieved to get the clean chit, but never looked nervous otherwise, Diwadkar said.

"I had to coax him into confidence because he is so young to get into such controverises," Diwadkar added.

The videotapes will be now distributed to the International Cricket Conference committee's experts and only after their view, will Harbajan be officially cleared. But, added Diwadkar, that should not be a problem as Titmus in such matters is rated very high.

Harbhajan will now play against the West Indies A team later this month -- but again under the eyes of the camera as the BCCI wants to view his action after the corrective method has been implemented.

UNI

Prem Panicker adds: Frankly, this latest news on the Bajju front strikes me as unbridled folly.

Check out the Titmus evaluation: it says that Harbajan tends to tilt his head to the left at the time of delivery, causing it to appear as though his arm is bent.

So?

Bottomline, the arm is not bent, it is merely a tilt of the head that gives that illusion, right? Right. So then, Harbajan is not responsible for your illusions, his business is only to deliver the ball with a straight arm -- which, even as per Titmus, he is now doing.

So the question that beats me is, if he is comfortable tilting his head, why the hell then should he straighten it? Umpires can't call him because his head is tilted, their business is to call him only if the hand is bent -- which, according to the ICC's own much-hyped expert, it isn't. So why then should Harbajan change an action he is comfortable, at the risk perhaps of losing his effectiveness?

In this context, two views from experts makes interesting reading. During the Dhaka tournament, Ravi Shastri, in the television commentary box, was asked about the entire Bajju controversy. Shastri's response echoes what we at Rediff have been arguing all along: "Why should the BCCI drop Harbajan simply because the ICC asked for it? It is not the ICC's business to dictate team selection, nor is it the match referee's business to examine the action of bowlers. If there is a problem, it is up to the umpire to call him on the field of play, and that is the only way to do it."

And then this, from Sunil Gavaskar, in his latest column in the Telegraph: "The BCCI sends Harbajan Singh to London to be scrutinised and advised by Fred Titmus. Now, Titmus was a fine spinner but by no stretch of the imagination was he a great one. Not that you have to be a great player to be a coach, but if you can show me any change in Rajesh Chauhan's action before and after Titmus saw and spoke to him, I will crawl on my knees for the rest of my life.

"What we in India are doing is just helping former cricketers from other countries to earn some extra income, while ignoring the former cricketers of our own country. We can well understand all time greats like Gary Sobers and Dennis Lillee coaching, for they are inspirational players and good communicators, and besides, there aren't any other players of the same calibre in India, but Titmus? At the end of a couple of days he will be smiling as he says, 'Thank you very much, this is the easiest pay packet I have received' and silently praying no doubt that after Chauhan and Harbajan, someone will find something wrong with Nikhil Chopra's action too."

Thus spake Sunny -- and he was bang on target, wasn't he? Chauhan's action remains the same. Harbajan has now been deemed to be clean -- the problem being put down to an "illusion". So then, it is the ICC match referee(s) who need optical evaluation, and not the young off-spinner, so what the hell was all that fuss about?

What is worse is BCCI secretary J Y Lele trying to earn points by saying the other day that the BCCI would not wait for the ICC ruling, but was going to pick Harbajan for the New Zealand tour anyway.

The trouble with Lele is that he seems to imagine that the rest of the country has the collective IQ of a peanut. I mean, just examine that statement for a minute.

If he wanted in fact to defy the ICC, what would he have done? Given the selectors the go-ahead to pick Bajju for the Sharjah tour, is what -- for remember, the selectors, the coach and the Indian captain wanted to pick him all along.

But no, he says the lad will be picked for the Kiwi tour. Sure, why not -- since, long before the Kiwi touring party is selected, Harbajan was due to return from England with the predictable clean chit?

So pray tell, where in all this is the defiance for which Lele expects us to applaud him? Where, in his statement, is there anything other than a patent desire to take cricket fans for a ride?