Peter Roebuck: Renaissance of the spin doctors (30 March 1997)

Sunday 30 March 1997

Renaissance of the spin doctors

By Peter Roebuck

SPIN is back. Twenty and 10 years ago it appeared in terminal decline. Cricket became a desolate scene. Everyone had a long run, and they all bowled bumpers. Even the Indians and Pakistanis were bowling fast; Kapil Dev and Imran Khan were heroes. The formidable Australian and West Indian teams of 1975 had shown the way. Ageing warriors like Bill O'Reilly raged against spin's passing, and mostly people laughed. It was as likely to return as the monarchy in France. Spin was dead.

And then the corpse burped. Ajit Wadekar was put in charge of Indian cricket and restored the tactics of his day, with crumbling pitches and lots of spinners. India started winning home matches again. A generation of batsmen appeared that was unused to tomfoolery.

Meanwhile Australia suffered under the yoke of finger-spin. They relied upon off-spinners such as Bruce 'Roo' Yardley, Greg Matthews and Tim May, and it gnawed at their innards. Their cricket has always been founded upon fast bowlers, leggies, cat-like footwork, clips to leg and curses. Mundanity did not suit them.

And then word began to spread about a blond-haired rooster at the Academy in Adelaide, who could give it a tweak. Apparently he was a handful, and they had been forced to send him home. Leg-spinners have always been the anarchists of the game. He sounded ideal.

To meet Shane Warne hereabouts was to discover a burly lad with a faltering run and a wrist that snapped like a crocodile's mouth. He was absorbed in his craft, and was forever experimenting with different sorts of spin. And he could give it a rip. To stand close by was to hear a buzz upon the ball.

The Aussies had found their man and they knew it. Former leg-spinners Jim Higgs and Terry Jenner showed him the tricks, and the novice lapped it up. Locals were tired of finger-spin and Greg Matthews' posturing in about equal proportion. They wanted cricket to be fun again.

Although he had not taken wickets in club cricket, within a year Warne was playing for his country and being given a flogging by the Indians. A few months later, he bowled out Sri Lanka to give his team a remarkable victory. The rest, as they say, is history.

Suddenly, spin was all the rage. It helped that Warne was a character, a surfer and partly reformed hell-raiser. He could bowl batsmen behind their legs and between them, make them look fools. He took wickets, won Test matches, and made spectators gasp. Youth could identify with him.

Spin was spreading like a fortuitous infection. Pakistan produced the two Mushtaqs, Ahmed and Saqlain, whose contribution has been to repair finger-spin's reputation. Saqlain has a mystery ball, which helped. Shahid arrived with top-spinners and a fast ball delivered with a Charlie Griffith action. Paul Strang was taking wickets in Zimbabwe, and in New Zealand a bespectacled teenager, Daniel Vettori, bowled his team to Test victory with crafty left-arm spinners.

Nor was spin prepared to retreat from one-day cricket. It featured strongly in the last World Cup. Both Pakistan and West Indies relied upon it Down Under, even Jimmy Adams and Shivnarine Chanderpaul rolling over their arms.

Astonishingly, England were also choosing two spinners. At Lord's last year, they played four pacemen and ran out of ideas by noon, an hour earlier than usual. Now they are asking lots of questions, even if none of them are all that good. Balanced attacks have returned.

All sorts of reasons can be found for this revival. Batsmen grew used to pace. No-one is scared any more. Between them, helmets, chest-pads, umpires and rules have taken fear from the game, though not the fear of failure.

Oh yes, spin is back. And yet, and yet. Complacency is the most insidious of vices. Despite Warne's eminence in recent years, the Aussies cannot find a second spinner and were forced to use Michael Bevan. Pat Symcox, a leathery off-breaker, thought not to regard a cup of Bournvita or a chapter from one of Miss Vita Sackville-West's novels sufficient to constitute an evening well spent, is the leading spinner in South Africa.

West Indies are still relying heavily on their pace bowlers, and spin remains weak in England. The corpse may be breathing steadily, but it is not yet walking upright, confident of its place on this earth.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)