Lendl Simmons*, the West Indies batsman, has been left looking for a new bat after a brush with overzealous customs officials in the USA.
Simmons was travelling through the country between games for Guyana Amazon Warriors in the Caribbean Premier League when his bat attracted the interest of customs officials. In a sure sign that cricket remains a mysterious and largely unknown sport in the USA, the officials feared that the bat could be used to transport illegal drugs so drilled several holes into it to enable closer inspection.
Initially it was thought that it was New Zealand and Amazon Warriors allrounder Jimmy Neesham's bat that was under scrutiny after he tweeted a picture of the ruined bat, saying: "Imagine if your cricket gear went through America and they drilled holes in your bat to look for drugs..."
Neesham later clarified that it was Simmons' bat. "Just to clarify again, the bat belongs to Lendl Simmons. Pretty happy I managed to dodge that bullet!"
Even i thought it was neesham's bat after he posted that pic.I would say what the US authorities did here was wrong.There is a limit to everything and this was uncalled for.
What would they do if a baseball bat was checked for drugs the same way..??
Unfortunately because these drug traffickers are finding ingenuous ways to get their drugs across the border the rest of us have to suffer through these kinds of incidents. I have seen on TV where custom agents even found drugs hidden in a climbing rope.
This story is funny but it just shows the ignorance of US customs. A cricket bat is made from solid wood so how can it contain drugs inside? I hope they paid Simmons for his bat and next time they will actually recognize a cricket bat.
Is there anything that prompted this drilling? Why Simmons?
Weird. And embarrassing. And no, drug traffickers being all clever doesn't justify them drilling bats. Would they compensate?
Simmons is the leading run scorer in this years CPL with 355 runs in 9 innings. He has the third highest average (44.37) of any batsman with a minimum of 4 innings.
