Faf du Plessis loses ball-tampering appeal

The bad news for Faf du Plessis is that he has lost his appeal against his ball-tampering conviction in Australia last month.

The good news‚ for him and South Africa’s supporters‚ is he has not been banned for the first test against Sri Lanka at St George’s Park on Monday. Instead‚ Du Plessis’ original punishment of a fine and three demerit points has been upheld.

The findings were released by the International Cricket Council (ICC) yesterday, following the appeal hearing on Monday.

“Polishing the ball with an artificial substance is clearly an offence,” the ICC said.

“A bright line is drawn in between polishing with a natural substance [for example sweat or saliva]‚ which is permitted‚ and with an artificial substance‚ which is not.”

The decision found favour with the man who laid the charge‚ ICC chief executive David Richardson‚ who was quoted as saying in a release: “Although it was not picked up by the umpires at the time‚ when the incident came to our attention subsequently we felt it was our responsibility to lay a charge in this case because the ICC can’t let such an obvious breach of this law pass without taking any action.”

Du Plessis has been in trouble since footage emerged of him polishing the ball using fingers taken from his mouth‚ in which there is a mint, during the test against Australia in Hobart last month.

Match referee Andy Pycroft took his entire match fee and left him one point shy of a ban.

For 24 months, the threat of a ban will hang low over Du Plessis‚ who could earn a fourth demerit point – which would trigger a suspension – for being found guilty of a level-two offence.

These are covered in 13 clauses in the ICC’s code of conduct for players‚ and deal with everything from conduct that is contrary to the spirit of the game‚ to using language that is seriously obscene‚ to showing dissent at umpiring decisions‚ to ball-tampering‚ time-wasting and match-fixing.