The International Cricket Council's decision to clear Australian left-arm finger spinner Matthew Kuhnemann has raised as many questions as answers. Kuhnemann was reported in the recent two-Test series against Sri Lanka by match officials for having a suspect action. He was cleared this week after testing at the National Cricket Centre in Brisbane, with Cricket Australia releasing a statement saying he was free to continue playing international cricket. Kuhnemann himself expressed his understandable relief saying he never doubted his bowling action. An accusation of an illegal action can ruin a bowler's career, as was the case when Ian Meckiff was called in the early 1960s, so the stakes in this case were extremely high. There is no reason to doubt that Kuhnemann does have a legal action given his successful Tests, but the process has raised questions. The ICC, which conducted the tests at the National Cricket Centre in Brisbane, won't release the report into Kuhnemann's action or any of the basic facts. Responding to a question from ABC Sport, a spokesperson from the ICC said: "We do not release the videos and detailed reports", adding that was standard policy. Clearly, confidentiality is important, but without explaining how the process was carried out and what the results were, the public and the cricket community are in the dark. Instead, there are legitimate questions: To what angle does Kuhnemann's elbow bend to? What are his mechanics? Was the testing done under match conditions and at match speeds? Those questions are relevant not only to Kuhnemann's future but also for other bowlers in the game and their coaches. Transparency is important for legitimacy because, without the data, uninformed critics may still be sceptical of Kuhnemann's action. Into the vacuum has come unsourced suggestions of what might be the case and rampant criticism of how he came to be reported in the first place. Those criticism sheets focus on the umpires and match officials who made the report in the first place and may be entirely unwarranted. If the testing revealed that Kuhnemann did flex his elbow, but not more than 15 degrees, then it not only exonerates him, it also exonerates the match officials who stepped out on a limb to report him in the first place. Reporting a bowler for having a suspect action does not mean that she or he has an illegal action. There have been previous cases of bowlers being tested and the data being released. A 2001 report into the Pakistan fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar by the Department of Human Movement and Exercise Science at the University of Western Australia was made public by the Pakistan Cricket Board. In 2004, the same department tested Sri Lankan off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan, whose action was one of the fundamental reasons the ICC changed its illegal delivery law to allow for up to 15 degrees of bend in the elbow. The same group tested India's Harbhajan Singh and South Africa's Johan Botha as the sole testing centre for the ICC in Australia at the time. The University of Western Australia's Emeritus Professor Bruce Elliott is one of the scientists who tested those bowlers. Elliott says while his reports were delivered to the ICC, he spoke freely to journalists about the results of his tests and his testing methodology if asked. "It didn't ever seem any problem with us talking about the actual data that was collected or how the data was collected during each of the bowling episodes, so we were able to say what we did, how we controlled the environment and what results were determined from the test," he said. He said it was in the bowler's interest to have the information made publicly available. "They're the ones under the microscope if you like," he said. "Number one you should be able to talk about how the testing took place, and that would convince people that in actual fact the bowler was doing what he would do in a match. "And secondly, how the elbow angles were assessed and what elbow were determined. "People would look at the one that's been recently done (Kuhnemann's testing) and say: 'we would like to know.'" Elliott said releasing the basic data from the testing "is to the advantage of the game." "It's to the bowler's advantage to say that out of X number of deliveries he bowled, he bowled them under the eye of a cricket coach who would state that they were valid deliveries and then what the levels were," he said. He said that making the information available removes the ability for casual observers to have any doubts about a bowler's action after they've been reported, tested and found to be within the legal range. "You almost put this to bed for all people and that's why I think it's better for the game — it's better for the player that people know what the case is," he said. ABC sport asked the ICC a series of questions about why it didn't reveal data on bowling tests and on the specifics of the Kuhnemann case, but didn't receive a reply Matthew Kuhnemann has been tested and found to have a legal bowling action to the relief of not only the bowler, but all in the Australian cricket community. Revealing some of the data and methodology of how he was cleared, would remove any lingering and unwarranted stain on both the bowler and the match officials who reported him.