Sinclair 'disgusted' by Patel no-ball

The Central Districts captain Mathew Sinclair was "disgusted" by the Wellington offspinner Jeetan Patel "throwing" a delivery during their State Championship match on Saturday. Patel bowled a delivery with a bent arm in Sinclair's innings of 164 and was no-balled by the umpire.

"I'm not sure what that's all about, I was pretty disgusted with it," Sinclair told the Dominion Post. "My opinion is he is a [New Zealand] player. He's a contracted player, he's represented his country, even though it was a hard-slog day, some would say it's not in the spirit of the game.

"You won't see things like that in my team, I can tell you that. We'll play hard and give it 120% without having to throw the ball."

However, the Wellington coach Anthony Stuart defended Patel and said Sinclair should "just shut up and bat". "It's got nothing to do with him, to be honest," he said. "The umpire's there to make a call and I don't know what his problem is."

Stuart said Patel's throw was actually an attempt to bowl the doosra. "He wasn't trying to disrespect anyone, he was trying something different and it didn't work," he said. "They were obviously batting pretty well. It's a non-event, as far as I'm concerned."