Raju Korti
Few contests in world sport carry
the emotional voltage of an India–Pakistan clash. Yet, in the fevered build-up
to Sunday’s blockbuster, the loudest conversation is not about Abhishek
Sharma’s expected fireworks or how Babar Azam would fare. It is about the
unsettling sling of Pakistan’s newest X-factor, Usman Tariq.
Tariq burst into the T20 World Cup with three scalps against the USA, bamboozling batters who looked like students facing a pop quiz in quantum physics. Variations flowed, the trajectory dipped late, and confusion reigned. But so did suspicion.
His approach is theatrical. A staggered, diagonal shuffle, a dramatic pause that seems to suspend time itself, and then a slinging release that shields the umpire’s view. Some see innovation. Others smell illegality.
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| (Pic an Instagram grab) |
At the heart of the debate lies the ICC’s 15-degree rule, which allows a bowler’s elbow to flex up to 15 degrees during delivery. Anything beyond that constitutes throwing, or chucking. Modern biomechanical testing replaced the days when umpires dramatically no-balled offenders mid-match, as happened with a young Muttiah Muralitharan in the 1990s, a saga that once led Sri Lanka to walk off in protest. Today, umpires can only report suspicious actions. Formal testing follows later.
Tariq has already been reported twice in the Pakistan Super League and cleared both times by PCB-conducted tests. That, in theory, should end the argument. Yet controversy rarely obeys laboratory reports.
Adding fuel to the fire is Muralitharan himself, now bluntly calling Tariq’s action “completely illegal” and questioning the ICC’s silence. According to the Sri Lankan legend, it is not just the elbow bend but the exaggerated pauses that make a mockery of rhythm and regulation.
History offers uncomfortable parallels. Saeed Ajmal, Shoaib Akhtar, Shane Warne’s teammate Brett Lee was questioned early in his career, and even Murali spent years under the scanner, largely due to the congenital bend in his arm that made legal deliveries look illegal to the naked eye. Several others were eventually barred or forced to remodel their actions, often ending careers overnight.
Yet there is a dissenting voice, and it comes from Ravichandran Ashwin. The cerebral off-spinner has argued that the laws increasingly favour batters and suffocate bowlers’ creativity. If actions pass biomechanical tests, he believes, perception should not become prosecution. Some quietly wonder whether Ashwin’s own occasional last-moment hesitation in his delivery stride makes him more sympathetic to Tariq’s methods.
As for Tariq, he has consistently maintained that his action is natural, within the legal limit, and repeatedly cleared by testing. The pause, he insists, is part of his rhythm and deception, no different from batters backing away or shuffling across the crease. Pakistan, unsurprisingly, see no problem. A wicket-taking mystery spinner in a World Cup is not something any team volunteers to lose, especially before facing India.
And so, as the cricketing world counts down to another chapter in the sport’s fiercest rivalry, Usman Tariq stands at a curious crossroads. To some, he is innovation incarnate. To others, a throwback to cricket’s murkiest controversies.
Sunday’s match may be decided by runs and wickets, but beyond the scoreboard, a deeper question lingers: where does bowling genius end and illegality begin? In cricket, as in life, the finest lines are often the most fiercely debated.
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