ICC Announces Changes To Playing Conditions, Saliva Use Completely Banned

The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Tuesday announced several changes to its playing conditions after the Chief Executives' Committee (CEC) ratified recommendations from the Sourav Ganguly-led Men's Cricket Committee, which discussed MCC's updated 3rd Edition of the 2017 Code of the Laws of Cricket and shared its conclusions with Women's Cricket Committee, who endorsed the recommendations to CEC. The main changes to the Playing Conditions will come into effect on October 1, 2022.

"It was an honour chairing my first meeting of the ICC Cricket Committee. I was pleased with the productive contribution of the Committee members which resulted in key recommendations being made. I thank all members for their valuable input and suggestions," Ganguly stated in an official release.

The ICC Cricket Committee comprises -- Sourav Ganguly (Chair); Ramiz Raja (Observer); Mahela Jayawardena and Roger Harper (Past Players); Daniel Vettori and VVS Laxman (Representatives of Current Players); Gary Stead (Member Team Coach Representative); Jay Shah (Full Members' Representative); Joel Wilson (Umpires' Representative); Ranjan Madugalle (ICC Chief Referee); Jamie Cox (MCC Representative); Kyle Coetzer (Associate Representative); Shaun Pollock (Media Representative); Greg Barclay and Geoff Allardice (Ex Officio - ICC Chair and Chief Executive); Clive Hitchcock (Committee Secretary); David Kendix (Statistician).

The changes that will come into effect from October 1, 2022 are:

Batters returning when caught: When a batter is out Caught, the new batter will come in at the end the striker was, regardless of whether the batters crossed prior to the catch being taken.

Use of saliva to polish the ball: This prohibition has been in place for