Pakistan hold the copyrights to ball-tampering: Sandhu

Pakistan legend Imran Khan's defence that all teams tamper with the ball after Shahid Afridi was caught biting the ball during Sunday's ODI against Australia, has not gone down well with former India medium pacer Balwinder Singh Sandhu.

Imran Khan, who once admitted scratching the ball with a bottle crown

Sandhu was part of the Indian team which lost 0-3 to Pakistan in 1982-83. "By saying other teams do it, Imran is offering a lame excuse. If others are tampering with the ball, why should the Pakistanis? By the way, according to me, they hold the copyright when it comes to ball-tampering. They are masters at it and they taught others," Sandhu told MiD DAY.u00a0 During his debut series in Pakistan, 1982-83, Sandhu suspected something was being done to the ball by the Pakistani bowlers and fielders during drink intervals.

"Our doubts were confirmed when some of their players, who were dropped during the series told us that the ball was tampered with," said Sandhu. Imran is reported to have said recently that he never tampered with the ball, but in the book Imran by Ivo Tennant, he admitted using a bottle crown to scratch the ball. Sandhu's mind went back to the 1982-83 series. "Poor Vishy (Gundappa Vishwanath) had to bear the brunt. "He did not get runs in that series. Had he scored heavily, he would have made the following tour to the West Indies, but his international career ended with that Pakistan tour," said Sandhu.

Kapil was greater
The Mumbai-based swing bowler, who claimed the wicket of Gordon Greenidge in the first over of the 1983 World Cup final against the West Indies, stressed that he did not rate Imran higher than his former captain Kapil Dev.

"Kapil was a very clean cricketer. He got all his wickets without doing funny things with the ball. Richard Hadlee was clean too. Imran will never be on top of my list of great bowlers," Sandhu signed off.