I was an amateur sportsman most of my adult life. (no money at all in it) As such I felt I was honour-bound to follow and obey the rules. If I thought a rule was wrong, I would agitate at admin level to change/modify/abolish that rule. In my later years I acted as Chair of the Committee, to put something back into the sport. I am a hardliner; cheats are out, either suspended for a period, or forever.
For those of you who are not cricket fanatics. let me explain something. The reason for roughening up one side of the ball in as follows. The bowler constantly polishes one side of the ball - that is legal. As the match progresses, the other side of the ball becomes rough. Then later ion in the innings the spinners come on and use that to aid their spin. The idea of roughening it up early is so that Offies like Nathan Lyon and Leggies like Warnie can take advantage of this. If one side is polished and the other is rough, the ball can go "Irish" ie. It will go one way in the air and the other way off the pitch. Also tampering with the seam helps. Every time the ball land on the lifted seam, it gets double the spin. Seamers like Glen McGrath love this, cos you get lots of edges to slips.
NB If you look at the Principle of Aerodynamics, you will find good reasons for this phenomena.
