Three questions for cricket

The recently departed Richie Benaud was full of helpful suggestions and sage advice, and I was reminded of one of his persistent observations - "Cricket is the most controversial game of all" - a few times this week.

For instance, why did James Anderson, England's leading Test wicket-taker, on the eve of the first Test against West Indies, admit he wasn't the same bowler during the World Cup?

Anderson blamed his lack of aggression on the threat of being suspended in the aftermath of the Trent Bridge incident with Indian allrounder Ravindra Jadeja. I can understand Anderson curbing his on-field motor-mouth antics by applying a zipper but I don't understand how that would have an effect on his aggressive approach to batsmen.

If a fast bowler needs something - other than the sight of a batsman trying to take the food from his mouth - to get him riled, then there are a number of sources open to him. In the World Cup for instance, he had the devastating effect of bulging bats, the punishing field restrictions and England's woeful performance, any one of which should have been ample provocation for a burst of vengeful aggression.

Why he needs to engage in verbal fisticuffs with batsmen on a regular basis to be at his best is a mystery. Former Australian legspinner Bill "Tiger" O'Reilly was one of the great batsmen-haters of the bowling fraternity. He despised them, and once, when asked if he'd ever tried to Mankad anyone, said disdainfully: "Son, I never found a batsman that keen to get to the other end."

Tiger had a simple solution: dismiss batsmen and then you didn't have to deal with them again that day.

My next question. Why did Alastair Cook send in a nightwatchman in England's first innings in Antigua when Ian Bell was dismissed off the last ball of the penultimate over of the day?

It was obvious that Ben Stokes would be on strike for the first ball of the last over. That made it a reasonable assumption that the nightwatchman - James Tredwell - wouldn't face a ball. Why then not have the much more proficient and aggressive Jos Buttler out in the middle, ready to savage the bowling first thing the next morning?

Nightwatchmen can be handy on occasions but this move made no sense. There should be more nightwatchmen like Sussex's Robin Marlar; he was once sent out to stall and was dismissed, stumped for six off the second ball he faced.

Now that's the way to show disdain for a captain's impudence.

And finally, a conundrum that has exercised my mind for a long time. ESPNcricinfo colleague Daniel Brettig mentioned the other day that some of Australia's "high-performance people" reckon if Brett Lee had trained the way they wanted him to, he'd have touched 165kph on the speed gun.

I'm not convinced. Without the benefit of any medical or mathematical prowess to reach this conclusion, I reckon the human body has a "governor", much like those huge road trains, and it's set around the 160kph (100mph) mark.

What's my proof?

International cricket has been played for nearly a century and a half, all of it on a 22-yard long pitch. In that period the human body has increased in height and, in a lot of cases, strength, and yet the measurement still works. If the expansion of the human body had resulted in a marked increase in pace, then the length of the pitch would need to be extended, as the batsmen wouldn't have time to react to the fastest delivery.

In the period from Australia's Frederick "the Demon" Spofforth to Pakistan's Wahab Riaz, there hasn't been a bowler who was just too quick for a batsman's reactions. Some have come close, with England's Frank "Typhoon" Tyson and Australia's Jeff Thomson probably the nearest, but no fast bowler has yet made the 22 yards redundant.

I would love to know how the old-timers hit upon that measurement. If it was, "Ah 22 yards, that looks about right", then they should have immediately invested in a lottery ticket, because that would be the best example of dumb luck I've ever heard about.