The Indian cricket board suspended the ban of using saliva to shine cricket balls for the Indian Premier League (IPL). This decision follows an overwhelmingly favorable show of support for the change from the tournament’s franchise captains. This decision is even more surprising since the International Cricket Council (ICC) made that ban permanent in September 2022. The ban on evictions—originally enacted in May 2020 as a short-term measure in response to the COVID-19 pandemic—was a huge success. In fairness to the other side of the equation, sweat has never been allowed – at least, not legally.
Permitting the use of saliva would make for a more level playing field for bowlers in T20 franchises. For each of these reasons playing in these leagues strongly favors the batsman. The IPL will begin on Saturday with a thrilling opener between defending champions, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) and Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) at Eden Gardens. In the next two months, 74 matches will be played in 13 different cities!
Indian fast bowler Mohammed Siraj, representing the Gujarat Titans, welcomed the move.
"It's excellent news for us bowlers because when the ball is not doing anything, applying saliva on the ball will increase the chances of finding some reverse swing," said Siraj.
In terms of keeping the offense-defensive dynamic balanced, saliva is reintroducing its presence on the otherwise black, shiny ball. This shine is fundamental to producing swing, one of the most important aspects of bowling mechanics. Saliva plays a larger role in red-ball cricket, the standard format of the game played during Test matches. It has hugely important roles even in the context of white-ball formats such as One Day Internationals (ODIs) and T20s.
While this change in the IPL marks an exciting step forward, worries about hygiene and health remain. Former Indian pacer Venkatesh Prasad stressed the need for caution.
"The ban on applying saliva was also about maintaining cleanliness. Anything can happen today, we don't know how many—and when—a new virus enters the air. So, I think you need to be very careful in making a decision about lifting the ban," Prasad commented.
There remains a consensus among many players and experts that the odds are often stacked against bowlers in T20 leagues due to batter-friendly wickets. The ban on saliva was lifted in hopes of bringing some equilibrium to the ever-ongoing battle between bat and ball.
Under Jay Shah’s tenure as secretary of the BCCI, ICC made a bold move to ban saliva usage in cricket. They further demonstrated through research that saliva does not provide any substantial improvement to reverse swing. In rebuttal to this, bowler R Ashwin is of the opinion that if it’s not an issue, then it should be allowed.
"ICC released some research papers which said that saliva did not aid reverse swing much and that not putting saliva on the ball has not made a huge difference. I don't know how they did the research, but saliva should be allowed anyways if it is not a problem," Ashwin stated.
So bowlers resorting to using saliva as a short cut to sharpen the competitiveness of the game. Such an innovation, if successfully implemented, might just be able to bring back some of the magic of reverse swing in Test Matches.
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