Lawson cast doubts over accuracy of speed guns
By ANISunday, February 7, 2010
MELBOURNE - Former Australian fast bowler Geoff Lawson has expressed his admiration of Shaun Tait’s bowling performance in the Twenty20 game against Pakistan, but has cast doubts over the accuracy of the speed gun that clocked his 160.7km/h delivery.
Lawson felt the delivery, reportedly the fastest ever recorded in Australia, was not that fast, and some of Tait’s other deliveries on the night looked quicker.
“That 160.7 ball didn’t look that quick. It got through to [Brad] Haddin at about knee height and it was dying off the pitch,” The Sydney Morning Herald quoted Lawson, as saying.
“He bowled a couple of others that were good-length balls that were still rising to Haddin, who was almost standing on the edge of the fielding circle. Those balls were super-quick,” he added.
Lawson feels the technology used for measuring the speed of bowling varies to a point where it is hard to take it seriously.
When asked if he thought Tait could break Pakistan fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar’s record of having the fastest ball ever recorded at 161.3km/h, Lawson said: “It just depends whose radar you’re using at the time.”
“The radar’s not an absolute measure of the speed, it’s prone to error. You don’t know exactly how fast you’re going to bowl. [Speed guns] all vary. They vary from place to place and they’ve all got to be calibrated and that sort of stuff. They’re not absolutely correct … They’re certainly indicative, but they’re not absolutely correct,” Lawson said.
“I remember back to the ball Brett Lee bowled which was the 160-odd one, and all the cricket people watching it said, ‘No way!’ I think it got through to Adam Gilchrist dying at chin height. It just didn’t look like a quick ball. I think it’s an issue that, dare I say, the media like to play on,” he added. (ANI)
