BIPIN DANI
Mirpur (Bangladesh): Playing in his second Test match here the Indian pacer Jaydev Unadkat has made a special shoe in his shoe-pair having a hole at toe space in it. On the opening day of the Test match against Bangladesh, the TV cameraman spotted it and zoomed at it. He has especially done so to reduce pressure on the toe. This has been a practice many fast bowlers adopt, informs India's ex-fast bowler S. Sreesanth.
Speaking exclusively, he said, a lot of bowlers who bowl yorkersand put a lot of effort (in bowling) take off a bit of part of his shoes, especially the landing leg. It is basically for the portion of big toe touching the soft leather of shoe to the hard surface of the ground and thereby chances of getting injured. To minimise this, the bowlers get the toe portion of the shoes removed".
Explaining the biomechanics, Australian expert, Mark Portus, who runs an Academy (called Pace Doctor), says, "It is relatively a common practice for the quicks, it helps relieve compaction of the big toe through the front foot contact phase. I am not aware of spinners doing it, not as much stress through the front foot for the spinners so probably not needed. The only disadvantage it can bring is to compromise the integrity of the shoe and it can break down quicker but most quicks will take this downside to reduce the trauma on the toe. It actually is quite painful".
"Bowlers cut a hole in the cricket boots to relieve the pressure on the big toe. Sometimes the foot slips inside the boot and the big toe gets jammed on the end. So the hole cut out is to ease the pressure on the foot. The hole is cut from the upper part of the boot where the big toe is", says Ian Pont, who has been the fast bowling coach for several international and league teams and now works as a head of the National Fast Bowling academy in England.
