India and Australia are currently engaged in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2024-25, where the Indian side had been wrapped up for 150 runs in their first innings. Though Australian batters were seen struggling on the pitch and their team’s inning got ended on 104 runs as they trailed India by 46 runs, they flopped well.
Following this flop performance by the hosts in Perth, fans and former cricketers started raising questions about the ball that was being used in the match. Former Australian cricketer-turned-commentators Aaron Finch, Greg Blewett, and James Brayshaw made some big statements about the ball that was being used by Cricket Australia (CA).
As they were commentating the match, former Australian cricketer James Brayshaw stated that CA had changed the Kookaburra ball around four years ago, as they added some extra lacquer on it in order to improve the stitching quality of the ball.
“That was given to us about the new Kookaburra ball they changed it about four years ago put the extra lacquer on it and improve the stitching and I think has been much improved since then but the batting averages in this country have dropped by 10 across the board since then in the four years so add that to some more souped-up pitches and battings become a lot more difficult,” said Brayshaw.
As he agreed to this comment made by James, Greg Blewett, who is also a part of the commentary panel said that since the CA had changed he ball, the batting average by Australia has come down from 44 to 34.
“Yeah, I think it was from 2016 to 2020 the Australian batting average was 44 and then since the change of the kookaburra ball the sort of higher seam and the extra lacquer the average has come down to 34. Big change,” said Greg.
Aaron Flinch then came on to explain to the fans who are watching the ongoing Test between India and Australia that the extra layer of lacquer helps in keeping the ball harder for longer. This explanation was made because there was criticism that the ball goes soft early.
“Yeah for the people at home what the extra lacquer layer of lacquer does on the ball is it just keeps it harder for a little bit longer so in the past there’s been criticism that the ball goes soft really quick particularly on hard Australian surfaces so what it does now is with that extra layer it just is another layer of protection that shines up a lot better there’s also something about it that helps it swing a little bit more consistently so yeah I think it’s been really good since I’ve retired,” Aaron said.
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