Sport

Flintoff should take a break: Fraser

London: Former England seam bowler Angus Fraser has suggested that injury-prone all-rounder Andrew Flintoff should consider taking a three-month break from cricket to re-work on his action.

In an exclusive interview to The Hindu here on Tuesday, Fraser said, “His (Flintoff’s) left foot lands at an angle and then twists. This is putting enormous stress on his ankle. It is not easy to modify one’s bowli ng action at this stage but Flintoff should try this out. Even here, there are no guarantees.”

Flintoff has already come under the surgeon’s knife thrice to mend his ankle. And soon after his return to the English side following yet another operation on his ankle after the World Cup, the injury appears to be coming back to haunt him again.

Fraser spoke on the variations in length a bowler had to bring about in one-day cricket. “I tried to bowl on a length, depending on the pitch and the man facing me, from where I could get the ball to nip back and hit the batsman around his thigh guard.”

The 42-year-old Fraser knows what he is taking about. He claimed 47 wickets in 42 ODIs for England at a laudable economy rate of 3.54. In Test cricket, he was a match-winning paceman with 177 wickets in 46 Tests at 27.32. He could bowl his leg and off-cutters with precision, extract bounce, find the edges and breach defences.

He said the away-going delivery still held much value in one-day cricket, and a lot depended on how much a captain was willing to back his bowler. “You need to pick wickets in the one-dayers, and the out-swinger and the leg-cutter will never go out of fashion, even later in the innings. Edges could go for runs but can also result in wickets if you have someone in the slips, or someone slightly wider or deeper.”

The proposed rule change in ODI cricket, which would make it mandatory for the umpires to change the ball after the 35th over, could take the reverse swing out of the game, he said. “The rule will benefit the batsmen. The batsmen could also find striking a harder ball easier in the end overs.”

Fraser has been impressed with left-arm paceman Zaheer Khan. “He brings variety, can swing and seam the ball from over and around the wicket, is consistent and can be hostile.” He added Ajit Agarkar was “someone who made things happen, even if he went for runs.”

On Munaf Patel, he said: “Some time back I thought he was among the brightest young fast bowling talents.

“He is returning from an injury. You have to give him more time,” he said.

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