MCC seek clarification on illegal bats

The Marylebone Cricket Club, the guardian of the game's laws, is seeking clarification from the ICC over the controversial issue of graphite-backed bats, after a week in which England's debutant, Owais Shah, scored 126 runs with a similar make of bat that Ricky Ponting, Australia's captain, was recently asked to change.

The Kookaburra "Kahuna", which Ponting has stopped using, and "The Beast", which Shah waved in India, have a thin strip of graphite running down the spine, an accessory which contravenes Law 6.1 - "the blade of the bat shall be made solely of wood".

During last week's first Test at Cape Town, Ponting had reverted to a conventional bat, and expressed surprise that Shah had been allowed to play with the graphite-enhanced version.

"He can't use it, he'll be suspended," said Ponting. "It was supposed to be banned as of the 12th of this month, which was the last one-day game the other day. That was all the feedback I received from Kookaburra and everybody else, but guess what I'm using in Durban then!"

Roger Knight, the secretary and chief executive of MCC, felt that without clear guidance from the ICC, umpires were being put in an awkward position. "[The graphite backing] does not strengthen [the bat] but does stiffen it," he told listeners to BBC's Test Match Special, "which probably means it exerts more power."

"The patent application refers to the back of the blade being carbon graphite and, as it says in the laws, the blade must be made solely of wood. We have no authority to tell umpires how to umpire the game but there is quite a lot of questioning of us as to what umpires should do.

"At international level it's very much the ICC which has to implement the law. If they want to put in place a playing condition they are of course entitled to do. We have made our ruling on whether it complies or not - we are waiting for the ICC and other bodies to implement it."