One of the world's leading cricket biomechanics experts has called for greater scrutiny of suspect bowling actions around the world after Australia spinner Matthew Kuhnemann was reported during the recent Test series in Sri Lanka. Kuhnemann has been tested in a lab at the National Cricket Centre by an International Cricket Council (ICC) panel of appointed experts and the results are expected this week. A University of Sydney lecturer in biomechanics at the Faculty of Medicine and Health, Rene Ferdinands, said Kuhnemann's report has set a precedent that should be applied equally to other bowlers in world cricket. "All players really should be subject to the same standards of scrutiny and enforcement, so they should be subject to the same level of review," Dr Ferdinands said. "If this doesn't happen it could be thought to be a selective or inconsistent sort of application of the reporting standard." Dr Ferdinands said the reporting of Kuhnemann by ICC match officials did not mean he was bowling illegally. "It just means it needs to be investigated," he said. He said the fact Kuhnemann was reported showed the system is working, but he believes there are other bowlers in international cricket with suspect actions. "There are bowling actions [out] there that need to be placed under the same level of scrutiny that was placed on Matthew Kuhnemann for this process to be consistent and fair and to be effective," Dr Ferdinands said. The current ICC law on throwing states that a delivery is considered illegal if "the player's elbow extends by an amount of more than 15 degrees between their arm reaching the horizontal and the ball being released". In the early 2000s, Dr Ferdinands, who completed a PhD in the biomechanics of fast bowling, produced research that was instrumental in developing the 15-degrees rule following the outcry over the action of Sri Lanka off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan. In a 2004 study of a group of more than 80 spin, medium-pace and fast bowlers in New Zealand, he found that bowlers generally bowled within a change in elbow extension angle of 15 degrees. As early as 2005 — the year the ICC brought in the 15-degrees rule — Dr Ferdinands was warning about the potential dangers of fast bowlers who could throw within the existing laws. Dr Ferdinands played a first-class match for Northern Districts in New Zealand during a 15-year career as a grade cricketer in Australia and New Zealand. He has worked as a cricket biomechanics coach around the world, including stints with the Cricket Academy of India and the Sri Lankan national squad. Young cricketers being influenced by watching top players In Australia, he has worked with first-class representatives and is currently coaching grade club players and elite young juniors. He said since December he has seen six players with suspect actions through his work as a bowling coach, including high-level grade cricketers and talented juniors. And most of them do not even realise they are breaking the rules. "Some of them when you speak to them aren't aware that they're actually doing it and it becomes difficult to even convince them that they are. "Some of them think they're going to be within 15 degrees, others somehow think they are hyperextending, but they have no hyperextension in the elbow." He said he was seeing more bowlers now with suspect actions than he was 15 years ago, arguing young bowlers were picking up cues from cricketers with problematic actions through the glut of internationally televised cricket. "I basically think there is an issue here in terms of they do see certain actions on TV, and they pick some of these up as potential models and I think that's the great danger here in terms of just letting this issue run," he said. "I actually think there are suspect actions that people see internationally, or even in the first-class realm." And he said that was giving younger players the idea that they have more leniency to bend their elbow than is actually legal. Dr Ferdinands said he had been to coaching clinics where finger-spinners were told "you have to bend the elbow a little bit these days", and he believes other modern coaching methods are also increasing the number of bowlers with potentially illegal actions. "It's a very strange model where and they only encourage an inefficient form of the front-on action," he said. "It's got a variety of inefficient mechanisms. "In some cases, you'll find the bowling action is so inefficient that they basically have to fall away to the left … and if you fall away so much to the left, it's very difficult to maintain a straight bowling arm. So that increases the risk of actually elbow flexion and extension. "If you go to young cricket academies, you go to young cricket clubs, you all see them doing this and young players are struggling with it and they either compensate with bending their spine in various planes, [which can] increase the incidence of back injury. "And/or you start to see an over-reliance on what I would say is suspect elbow mechanics as a compensatory mechanism." As for the argument that some bowlers can hyperextend their elbow (where the elbow bends backwards), Dr Ferdinands argued that was relatively rare. "There is real hyperextension in the odd bowler," he said. "[But] there's also a number of cases, especially if it happens rapidly, where [bowling] can give the illusion of actual hyperextension. "But if you have a look at it carefully from a mechanical point of view, when you're getting external rotation of the humerus rapidly and the arm is in a flex position then the arm can appear to bend. "The elbow can appear to bend backwards, but if you look carefully then you'll see that it's actually elbow flexion." As for solutions to Dr Ferdinands's concerns, he said testing of bowlers needed to be done in real-world situations — on the field — rather than in the lab. "In my view, the lab testing really is only there to supplement an evaluation of bowling, legality in the field of play; it is only there really to confirm what you have seen," he said. "So, in a sense you can see that the ICC measures somewhat reflect that because ultimately, they're saying that what happens in the laboratory has to be consistent with what happens in the field. "Which means video footage in the field is already by means of that argument, the gold standard. He said bowling in a lab was simply not the same as bowling under the pressure of an actual match. A bowler's mechanics could change by virtue of the fact that they are in an artificial environment or they could simply deliberately alter their action. He said lab tests should only be used to determine whether a bowler has a physiological anomaly — like an arm deformity. Otherwise, he said testing should be done in match conditions using two high-speed cameras placed perpendicular to each other. Dr Ferdinands's hope is that the Kuhnemann case will set a precedent that can be applied consistently to assess other players' bowling actions. "I would like this process [to operate] in such a way that is equitable, so that everyone falls under the same scrutiny," he said. "I don't think there's any shame being actually called out if you're assessed. "I mean, if I was a player, I would voluntarily submit myself to a bowling test every single day of the week — I wouldn't care because I'm very confident with my bowling action. "Bowling is not that difficult to achieve with a straight arm. "There is not a single excuse for a bowler to actually look like he's suspect, so a bowling coach has a responsibility to ensure that your bowling arm doesn't even come under [scrutiny]. "At the end of the day, the bowler is responsible for what his arm is doing and as a professional it is his duty to do that because no player has a right to contravene the laws."