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DANGEROUS BOWLING
The Hughes family were also
concerned that Phillip had been
subjected to excessive bouncers
(short pitched and high bouncing
balls) that increased his risk of
being hit and were concerned that
the umpires had failed to intervene
as they should have, to protect the
batsman.
The Coroner noted this was not
the first death to occur in a cricket
match and reinforces that cricket
is a potentially dangerous game.
It involves a heavy, hard ball being
speared at the batsman from a
relatively short distance at great
speed. It is a testament to the skill
and courage of those who play the
game at the highest levels that
more incidents don’t occur. Still,
safeguards are essential if death
and injury is to be minimized. The
precautions upon which player-
safety depend are:
•
The rules;
•
Their enforcement; and
•
Personal protective equipment.
The inquest heard from an
independent expert umpire that
the umpires on the day applied the
laws in relation to short pitched
bowling extremely well, none of the
relevant laws were breached and
no other action was required by the
umpires. The rules limit a bowler
to 2 bouncers above shoulder
height per over. There also possibly
existed a more general discretion to
intervene in the case of dangerous
short bowling not necessarily
above shoulder height, although
this was far from clearly expressed.
The Coroner did consider that
the drafting of the rules relating
to unfair bowling was ambiguous
as to precisely what constitutes
a “fast, short pitched ball” and
whether there is greater scope for
umpires to intervene to protect
tail-end batsmen. On that basis
he made a recommendation that
Cricket Australia review the rules to
address this ambiguity and provide
more guidance to the umpires
about how the laws should be
applied.
However this ambiguity had no
bearing on the application of the
rules to Hughes’ innings on the
day. The number and frequency
of bouncers bowled to Hughes
did not breach the rules and the
umpires called balls as short very
well on the day and responded as
required. Hughes was an in form,
top order batsman and there was
no suggestion he was struggling
to safely play the bowling, nor a
prompt to intervene in any way.
The Coroner noted that while
compliance with the rules makes
the game safer, it cannot make it
risk free. There was no suggestion
the critical ball was bowled
maliciously and neither the bowler
nor anyone else was to blame for
the tragic outcome.
SAFETY EQUIPMENT
Phillip Hughes was not wearing
the most up to date safety helmet
when he was struck. However,
even if he was, it was found that
this would not have protected the
area of his body struck by the ball.
Since Hughes’ death, equipment to
protect a batsman’s neck is being
developed including a stem guard
helmet extension, however the
consequent loss of neck movement
may be counterproductive to
avoiding other types of injuries
so the jury is still out on this
innovation. One of the Coroners’
recommendations was that Cricket
Australia continues its testing
and development of devices to
identify a neck protector that can
be mandated for wearing in at least
all first class cricket matches. This
is all that sensibly can be done. The
findings show safety equipment
needs to be viewed from a broad
perspective and there are many
different considerations to be taken
into account. Mandating a specific
precaution in response to a specific
tragedy should be done with great
caution as it can be misguided,
ineffectual and potentially harmful.
However ensuring that all player
equipment is safe and compliant
with Australian, or other relevant,
standards should be a key concern
of all sporting organisations.
EMERGENCY RESPONSE
The medical evidence was clear
that the injury suffered by Phillip
was un-survivable, regardless
of the skill and efficiency of any
emergency response. However, the
incident did expose some serious
shortcomings in the emergency
response procedures at the Sydney
Cricket Ground. These were:
THE STEMGUARD
IS A CLIP-ON
ATTACHMENT,
WHICH PROVIDES
ADDITIONAL
PROTECTION FOR
A BATSMAN’S
VULNERABLE NECK.
FEATURE -
CRICKET