New rules won’t affect my game: David Warner

David Warner, the Australian opener, has clarified that the new rules of restriction on bat sizes won’t have any impact on his game. According to the new rules, which will be in place from September 28, the bat dimensions have been reconfigured to an edge limit of 40mm and depth of 67mm (60mm for the depth plus an allowance of 7mm for a possible curve on the face of the bat). However, the opener has revealed that he has already changed his bat and is not at all unperturbed with the new rules.

International Cricket Council (ICC), released a long list of changed rules on Tuesday and confirmed that those will be implemented from Thursday (September 28). India and Australia are involved in a 5-match ODI series and it was reported earlier that the series will be played according to old rules. Hence, for this series, the batsmen can play with their older bats. The change in the rule of the bats has been made keeping in mind the balance between the bat and ball.

It didn’t really affect me then

Warner told reporters that the change in the dimensions of the bat won’t have affected him and he only needs to go back to his old one with which he started his career with.

“Well my bats have already been changed. I’ve been using them for the last couple of weeks. In Bangladesh, (I was) getting used to it. It is basically the same bat that I started my career with. So I just basically took it down to my bat maker and said, ‘We just got to go back to what we started with’. It didn’t really affect me then, so I don’t think it’d affect me now,” he was quoted as saying.

He also believed that everyone has been misled by the fact that bigger bats have helped the batsmen in hitting sixes. Previously he had defended the bat sizes and blamed the flat pitches being the reason for the batsmen having an upper hand over the bowlers.

“I think everyone’s sort of been misled in a way where they think the big bats clear the fences easier than what the old bats used to. From where I stand on it, basically, we were hitting sixes with the bats five-six years ago and still hitting sixes today. At the end of the day, you obviously have to use what you’re given and it’s not going to make a difference at all,” Warner added.