I do think that any punishment meted out to Afridi should have begun immediately. As Mr Gower pointed out onk SKY last night, Afridi should not be allowed to benefit in any way from his illegal actions, therefore he should not be allowed to bowl on that pitch. In fact, I would go as far to say that if the umpires believe those actions actually altered the condition of the pitch then the match should be abandoned and awarded to the other team. If a bowler is caught out altering the condition of the ball then that ball is immediately changed, this is difficult with the pitch. If Team A bats first and scores 500 what is to stop a member of that team then scuffing up the pitch to ruin Team Bs chances of scoring so many runs? The player might get a one match ban and miss the next Test but that's hardly going to stop them!

What does everyone else think? How severe do punishments have to be to stop this sort of behaviour (and I'm well aware it's the first time Afridi has doen anything of the sort)??