The International Cricket Council’s efforts to rid the game of bowlers with illegal action has found sup­port from Australian coach Darren Lehmann.

Six bowlers – Sachithra Senan­ayake (Sri Lanka), Kane William­son (New Zealand) Prosper Ut­seya (Zimbabwe), Sohag Gazi, Al Amin Hossain (both Bangladesh) – including the world’s top spinner Saeed Ajmal, have been reported in the past three months.

Ajmal, who has been Pakistan’s lead spin­ner across formats was banned last week after a biomechanical analy­sis of his action found his bowl­ing arm flex to be way above the 15 degrees allowed. His action was reported during last month’s Galle Test against Sri Lanka.

Lehmann believes the ICC move will do the game of cricket a world of good. The former Australian batsman was recently nominated to the ICC Cricket Committee that had pushed for better methods to detect flex and suggested more sup­port for match officials to identify illegal actions with confidence,

He said: “The ICC have obviously decided to have a crackdown on it and that’s good for the game. We’ve got to make sure that area is right,” Lehmann told radio channel, Fiveaa. “If you’re within the rules then fine, if you’re not, then you’ve got to be looked at. That’s what they have decided to do.

“They have had a real crackdown on four-five players of late so what that tells coaches and players, and everyone coming through the game and the young guys, is you won’t be able to do any of that moving for­ward,” he added.

Lehmann also played down talk of a rift between himself and cap­tain Michael Clarke after the skip­per questioned the selectors’ deci­sion to leave out Steve Smith for a recent one-day international with Zimbabwe, which Australia lost.

“[There’s] nothing,” he said. “He said something, I said something. That’s what happened.

“Clarke and I laughed about that last couple of days, it’s been quite interesting. No issues whatsoever. We deal with those issues straighta­way and move on.

“Captains will be disappointed when they lose, as they should be, and as we want him to be. We were disappointed and that’s the way it goes sometimes.”