Mark Richardson, former New Zealand batsman, and now a commentator and a columnist said that he was convinced that Muttiah Muralitharan transgressed the fifteen mark set by the ICC and hence chucked on many occasions during the match. Muralitharan had been called for chucking in 1995-96 and then again in 1998-99, which had split the world and created a huge controversy. Murali had taken 7/161 in the first test match against New Zealand in their 202-run loss to Sri Lanka.
Richardson has also said that while Muralitharan had done nothing wrong in the controversy, the ICC was to blame for not having done a lot to ward out chucking in international cricket.
The Kiwi said that many of Murali’s deliveries fell around the fifteen degrees mark, but there were too many deliveries which went over 15 degrees and more so since the ICC tweaked the rule to accommodate it. Earlier, the rules stated that the any bowler bowling with above the ten degrees mark would be called for chucking, but in an experiment conducted, it was found that most of the bowlers went over the ten degrees mark.
The ICC then increased the threshold to 15-degrees mark, but now Richardson seems to have re-opened the can of worms by calling for the ICC to test the bowler during the match conditions only and not in a laboratory.