 Several proposals were made to prevent pad @-@ play . At a meeting of representatives of the main county cricket clubs in 1888 , one representative expressed the opinion that a " batsman who defended his wicket with his body instead of with his bat should be punished " . The representatives supported a motion to alter the law to state that the batsman would be out if he stopped a ball that would have hit the wicket ; in contrast to the existing wording , this took no account of where the ball pitched relative to the wickets . Further proposals included one in which the intent of the batsman was taken into account , but no laws were changed and the MCC merely issued a condemnation of the practice of using pads for defence . This reduced pad @-@ play for a short time , but when it increased again , a second <unk> by the MCC had little effect . 
