Hazlewood remarks will lead to close scrutiny by ref Crowe

IN TIME, Josh Hazlewood’s eyebrow-raising comments yesterday could prove the first good thing that has happened to England at this T20 World Cup.

- Malik Ouzia

In admitting publicly that Australia may contrive to extract some English humiliation from their meeting with Scotland on Sunday, the fast bowler probably did a fair bit to ensure that they won’t.

Cricket’s integrity warriors, a surprising number of whom seemed to be English, were quickly out in force yesterday, scrambling for the relevant page in the rule book that says any attempt to deliberately slow a chase — “knock it around and drag it out”, as Hazlewood put it — for the purposes of net run-rate manipulation could lead to a two-game ban for captain Mitchell Marsh.

The match referee for that final Group B match, Jeff Crowe, will go in with both eyes open and the Aussies, with the business end of the tournament to come, will want to avoid the rap.

Matthew Mott, England’s head coach for now at least, was yesterday relaxed about his countryman’s remarks, having previously worked with him at New South Wales.