By IANS,
Melbourne : Former England opener Marcus Trescothick has come out with an startling revelation that his side tampered with the ball during their historic 2005 Ashes win.
In his recently released autobiography, Trescothick claimed it was his job to shine the ball with a special brand of mints.
England’s ability to continuously get the ball to reverse swing early in the Australian innings, led to the downfall of the top order.
Cricket laws forbid the use of “any artificial substance” on the surface of the ball.
“I was firmly established as the man in charge of looking after the ball when we were fielding,” Trescothick was quoted as saying in The Australian.
“It was my job to keep the shine on the new ball for as long as possible with a bit of spit and a lot of polish — and through trial and error I finally settled on the best type of spit for the task at hand.”
Simon Jones and Andrew Flintoff regularly swung the ball inside the first 20 overs. Flintoff took 24 wickets at 27 runs and Jones 18 at 21 in the series.
Trescothick admits in the book he even experimented until he found the right brand of mint.
“I had a go at Murray Mints and found they worked a treat.”