Bowler ‘sick’ after bumper injures

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33778, 26 February 1975, Page 1

Bowler ‘sick’ after bumper injures

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, February 25. 1 he England fast bowler, Peter Lever, relived in Auckland tonight the awful moment when he thought he had killed the New Zealand batsman, Ewen Chatfield, with a bumper.

Speaking in a hushed and strained voice several hours after the incident, Lever said he could not describe the awful sickness he felt I when he saw Chatfield’s face going purple and his legs convulsing.

Lever was certain for a while that he had killed Chatfield.

“All through your cricket life you wonder about the possibilities of somebody getting hurt. . Now it’s happened and I feel nothing but ashamed and disgusted with myself,” the 35-year-old Lancashire player said. Lever explained why he bowled the bumper at the number 11 batsman: “Chatfield almost gave a catch off his gloves several balls earlier, and 1 thought this was the way to get him out. I brought two fieldsmen close to the bat and aimed for his gloves.

“But, God, I bowled the

ball too straight and he couldn’t get out of the way,” Lever said. “When the ambulancemen were working on Chatfield it was the closest I have come to praying for some time,” he said. ‘(iiving up* “Afterwards. 1 felt like giving up test cricket and just going back to village green stuff. 1 don’t feel like playing in the next test at Christchurch and 1 won’t be bowling any bouncers for a while,” Lever said. Chatfield . recovered consciousness an hour after being felled, and one of the first people he spoke to was Lever, who had rushed to the hospital from the ground. “He said ‘You look worse than 1 do,’ and ail 1 couid say to him was that was a bloody stupid thing to do,” Lever said later. He said he advocated laws “to protect batsmen and protect fast bowlers in the heat of a match.”

The “Evening Standard,” London, has published an interview with Lever in which he said, “I thought I had killed him. you know. Even now I can’t describe the feeling. No-one can, even when they have been involved. “People here try to offer consolation. They mean well, I know, but the point is Ewen Chatfield, he’s in hospital. “People who say ‘I know ihow you feel' are talking ' bullshit. They don’t know. I Not at all. What I can’t forget is that the ball was a ' deliberately short one. Not I deliberately at his head, but still deliberate,” said Lever. The “Standard” report, which said the fast bowler was upset during the interview. added: “Look. look. I don’t want any hloody sympathy, do you understand that? It has happened. It is my fault. If I get a bad press. I’ll have no grumbles or grouses. I deserve it.”

The incident was reported on the front page of both London’s two evening newspapers today with a photo- ) graph of Chatfield being carried off on a stretcher.

Radio stations also carried regular reports on the injury. The secretary of the M.C.C. (Mr Donald Carr) has expressed sympathy for Ewen Chatfield. But he pointed out that it was impossible to legislate against the use of bumpers. “This seems to have been purely an accident, but there has been a tendency throughlout the world for an increasi ing use of short-pitched balls They are an accepted part of the fast bowler’s armoury, I but should be strictly conI trolled by umpires. ' “It is impossible to legislate against all such i deliveries, but a procedure is laid down for the umpires Ito deal with intimidatory I bowling. The difficulty is to I obtain a consistent interpretation,” said Mr Carr.