MCC overhauls cricket laws; bans use of saliva

The Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), guardians of cricket's laws and spirit, has approved several changes for the 2022 code of law on Wednesday (today)—permanently banning use of saliva to shine the ball.

According to details, the ban of using saliva to shine the ball introduced because of COVID-19. It will become a permanent change.

In a further change, the controversial 'Mankad' dismissal—where a bowler runs out the non-striker in their delivery stride if the non-striker is backing up and has left their crease— is moved from the 'unfair play' section (Law 41) to be included alongside other run-outs (Law 38). 

The new code of laws will come into force from October 1, 2022.  

MCC has today announced its new code of Laws for 2022, which will come into force from 1 October.

Full information on the changes ⤵️#MCCLaws

— Marylebone Cricket Club (@MCCOfficial) March 8, 2022

There are several notable changes in Laws of Cricket, as below.

Players’ replacement

Introducing new clause (Law 1.3), the MCC announced that the replacements are now be treated as if they were the player they replaced on the field. 

They will receive the sanctions or dismissals which the player has done in that match.

Dead ball

The dead-ball sometimes plays a crucial role in the match and the MCC has made several changes and modified the law. 

The new law— 20.4.2.12— will allow the umpire to call it a dead ball when either side is disadvantaged by a person, animal or other object within the field of play. 

Previously, intruders (any object or animal) entered the ground—hurting the continuity of the game and sometimes give an advantage to either side. 

Batters returning when caught

According to Law 18.11, the MCC made a massive change announcing that if a batter gets caught, the player who comes to bat will start at the striker’s end (unless it is the end of an over).  

Earlier, if the batters crossed before the catch was taken then the new player would go to the non-strikers’ end but the law has changed to reward the bowler for taking the wicket. 

Striker’s right to play the ball 

The new Law 25.8 will allow the batter to hit the ball if it lands away from the pitch. 

Moreover, the batsman has to keep in mind that some part of their bat or person remains within the pitch. 

Fielding side’s unfair movement

In a series of change, the MCC pronounced that if there is any unfair movement by the fielding side while the ball is bowled, the batting side will be awarded with the 5 penalty runs. 

Earlier, it was referred to as the dead-ball and which turned into a disadvantageous for the batting side.

Bowler throwing towards striker’s end before delivery

Law 22.1 has been amended to take away the unfair advantage from the batters. In modern-day cricket, the batters play a lot of innovative shots and for that they move around the crease before the ball is moved to create doubts in the bowler’s mind. 

As per the new law, a ‘Wide’ will apply to where the batter is standing, where the striker has stood at any point since the bowler began their run up, and which would also have passed wide of the striker in a normal batting position