National off-spinner Sohag Gazi is likely to experience an unexpected end to his tour of West Indies with the Bangladesh team following his suspected bowling action in the second ODI on Friday.
Though there is no objection for playing Gazi in the remaining of the tour as his action has only been suspected to be illegal – not proven, but according to some Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) sources the team management in West Indies is thinking of sending the 23-year-old back.
The main reasons behind the decision are firstly his confidence level, which might hamper his performance, and secondly the team will suffer if by chance a ‘no ball’ is called due to his bowling action because he won’t be allowed to bowl further in the game, thus spilling water on the team strategy.
The final call, however, will be made by national chief selector Faruk Ahmed. It was learned, the team management has informed of their decision to send Gazi back to Dhaka to the chief selector and waiting for the nod from Faruk.
“The decision will be taken after the Twenty20 game because we still have some time in hand before Gazi undergoes the test in Cardiff,” said Faruk to Dhaka Tribune yesterday.
The afore mentioned thoughts of the Bangladesh team management means Gazi is most likely to be benched in the 3rd ODI and also in the lone Twenty20 international before he heads back home on August 28.
Moreover, his chances of playing the first Test versus the Caribbeans from September 5 can also be ruled out since he needs to get back to Dhaka in time to get the UK visa process completed, which usually takes a minimum 5-6 days, in order to able get his action tested at an ICC-accredited facility in Cardiff, England, on September 19.
Earlier on Sunday, the International Cricket Council (ICC) disclosed that Gazi was reported with a ‘suspected illegal bowling action’ during Bangladesh’s second ODI against West Indies in Grenada.
The match officials’ report which was handed to Bangladesh team manager Habibul Bashar on Saturday, cited concerns about the legality of the bowling action for all deliveries from Gazi who made his breakthrough in the international arena in 2012. He has so far played 10 Tests, 19 ODIs and nine T20Is for Bangladesh.
However, this is the second such instance in Gazi’s cricket career as he was first reported two years ago, during Bangladesh A’s tour to India, by an umpire in a tournament in Bangalore. The match referee had informed the manager, who let the BCB know of the matter. Since the report did not contain details of the problem, no further action or testing was undertaken.
Gazi is the fifth bowler - and the fifth off spinner - to have been reported for a suspected action following Zimbabwe’s Prosper Utseya, Sri Lanka’s Sachithra Senanayake, New Zealand’s Kane Williamson and Pakistan’s Saeed Ajmal.
The issue of suspect bowling actions had come up during the ICC cricket committee meeting in June, where there was a general consensus among members that the current methods used to detect illegal actions were imperfect. It recommended changes to help match officials get more support from biomechanists in order to identify illegal actions with “more confidence”.
