The Strange Death of English Leg Spin by Justin Parkinson (Book review)

I recently reviewed Twirlymen by Amol Rajan, a joyful, celebratory dance to the music of spin. Well almost entirely joyful. During the rare moments when Rajan wasn't being swept away by boyish enthusiasm, he also found time to offer the odd lament on cricket's greatest but most difficult art. Laments to opportunities not taken, not given or not recognised, to dreams dashed or unrealised, to promise unfulfilled or undeveloped, and to legacies lost or discarded.

That theme and in particular as it relates to English leg-spin (and chinaman bowlers) forms the central premise of this book. A story that begins brightly with a trickle of English (and Scottish) ingenuity and innovation, but which then goes south, literally, as first a stream of South Africans and then, a torrent of Australians take over. It is an extraordinary fact that only 5 wickets have been taken by English leg-spinners (Scott Borthwick 4, Mason Crane 1) in Ashes Tests since Bob Barber dismissed Graham McKenzie at Old Trafford in 1968.

In assessing how and why this happened, the author takes us on a familiar path through the main protagonists and innovators. En route he provides some welcome clarity on Bonsanquet's popularising rather than inventive relationship with the googly as well as suggesting a hidden, deeper meaning to the 'bosie' sobriquet. Despite admirably thorough research that brings out a few gems, one is still left with more questions than answers when it comes to the greatest of them all, SF Barnes - surely just as Barnes would wish it. I particularly enjoyed the speculative suggestion that Clarrie Grimmett, known for his attention to detail, employed fox terriers to retrieve the balls from his purpose built garden net because they were known for their high-energy level and low drool output!

As far as English wrist-spinners are concerned it has always been an uphill struggle. It is not enough that they must master the most difficult skill in the game, in which, as Ian Salisbury rightly notes, 'a centimetre wrong in your action can affect it by two yards at the other end', but they must also overcome an ingrained distrust of their art which has seemed to pass like contagion from captain to captain, era to era. It is hard not see in McLaren's reticence towards the admittedly erratic but dangerous Bosanquet and Hutton ( a leg spinner himself) and May's reluctance to utilise the myriad talents of Johnny Wardle, more than a hint of the risk averse tactics of the Strauss-Flower era. It is something of an irony that England's one international class wrist spinner, Adil Rashid, is born and raised in Yorkshire an area deemed by Hutton to be entirely unsuited, climatically, to such extravagant pursuits.

Instead English leggies have relied on the backing of deep thinkers such as Mike Brearley and Peter Roebuck and innovative risk-takers, such as Adam Hollioake who revived Ian Salisbury's career. Roebuck, speaking before the T20 revolution and way before England renaissance in the 50 over game, speculated that in a game where 400 was the new 250 leg-spin would be a risk worth taking. A point Rashid and others continue to prove.

Faced with such overwhelming negativity, it is no surprise that many such bowlers have headed for the Promised Land in search of love and understanding. In perhaps the most interesting and certainly original part of the book, Parkinson charts the progress of a number of young Englishmen sent to Australia to work with Terry Jenner, leg-spin guru and mentor to the Great One. The results were not, as if you need telling, messianic. Like Aubrey Faulkner, mentor to Ian Peebles, Jenner believed there was a right way, his way and a wrong way, all the others. In keeping with many of us who have spent years trying to perfect a simple leg-break, he saw Shane Warne not only as the perfect model but the only one. Unfortunately, and I could have told him this myself, this turned out to be completely folly. The result was a certain disillusionment for the characters concerned and undoubted disappointment for the ECB who had funded Jenner's work. But who knows, judging by Rashid's recent resurrection, perhaps it has a brought a greater appreciation and understanding as well. Dying maybe, but not dead yet.

Twirlymen by Amol Rajan (Book Review)

As someone who shared his shattered dream of a career amongst the 'twirlymen', I can easily relate Amol Rajan's almost obsessive enthusiasm for his subject. And whilst this book succeeds in its primary mission to inform and enlighten, it is the author's endless and unrequited passion for the tweaks, twirls and mystery of spin bowling that is its real feature.

The book charts the history of cricket's innovators: those who looked at a little red ball and thought "what if?". It is no surprise then that the annals of spin bowling encompass so many original thinkers and unusual personalities. In fact such are the fascinating, complex and frankly eccentric characters which make up the spin brethren, that this book would work well enough as series of separate biographies. The contrasting styles and personas of spin partnerships from O'Reilly and Grimmett to Ramadhin and Valentine, Bedi and Chandresekharar, and even Edmonds and Emburey are particularly enjoyable. The wide-range of interviews provide a rich source of evidential anecdote.

From a technical perspective the author provides a valuable service in debunking the claims of Dooland, Bosanquet and Saqlain to the flipper, googly and doosra respectively. Each, he establishes, were being bowled several decades earlier at the very least. Indeed he cites W.G. Grace as an early exponent of a flipper type delivery. None of this detracts from his rightful admiration for Shane Warne's ability to invent a new delivery or two prior to every Ashes battle. Deception is after all, an essential part of the twirlyman's armoury.

Although he makes efforts to bring along the uninitiated through some useful diagrams explaining the various deliveries it is to the already converted that this book's appeal really lies. He pulls few punches and is particularly forthright on the subject of Muttiah Muralidaran whilst taking Gideon Haigh to task for his rubbishing of  the humble off-spinner.

Whilst the author's enthusiasm is mostly endearing, too often it overflows into wide-eyed, childlike excitability at the cost of reasoned analysis. In particular, for a seemingly discerning chap it is disappointing to see him fall head first into one of the diseases of modern media. Just as an overbowled googly loses its impact, so too do superlatives when used excessively.

He reserves astonishing praise for a couple of left-arm spinners. The recently retired Rangana Herath was certainly a gifted and canny bowler who also bowled an interesting carrom ball early in his career, but to describe him as 'scintillating' is really pushing it; meanwhile Daniel Vettori, a fine bowler but of essentially simple method, is described as 'brilliant'. In a book which features Grace, Barnes, O'Reilly and Warne, such high praise ought to have been less liberally assigned. It's a small quibble but one that grates from quite early on.

Published eight years ago, the book has aged well. Perhaps too well. Of the new breed of twirlymen only the endlessly curious and imaginative Ravi Ashwin would now warrant serious mention. Mystery spinners may have enjoyed a renaissance in the T20 era, but it has also shown up the limitations of that format as a means of developing genuinely great bowlers possessing the control and subtlety to match their many variations. We still await the next exponent to whom the moniker 'brilliant' could justifiably be applied. Hopefully it won't be too long.

Mystery spinner? It's all in the mind, the batsman's that is..

It was always going to be an impossible task. After a handful of first-class matches and one season of IPL, how could we reasonably expect anything special on a Test debut? A debut made against one of the strongest batting line-ups and in conditions which could not be more different to those of Trinidad, the West Indies as a whole or even India. And yet it was impossible not to feel disappointed, maybe even a touch let down, as Kevin Pietersen laid into Sunil Narine's increasingly friendly offerings on Sunday afternoon.

Why should we take it personally? Maybe its because in this age of cynicism the opportunities to dream, to experience awe and wonder seem increasingly fleeting. Perhaps it's why the lure of a great magician remains, even if they must come up with ever greater illusions to grab and retain our attentions. Put simply, people still love a good mystery and in cricket that means spinners.

But a good mystery requires that the intrigue endures. And unless you are a fan of Columbo that means not finding out who did it in the opening scene. On Sunday, it seemed that Narine had been arrested, charged and was awaiting sentencing even before Nick Knight in the Sky box had time to begin his prosecution-by-video. Given that Narine's unveiler was Pietersen, a man who singularly and admittedly failed to solve the riddle of Saeed Ajmal, this was more the equivalent of being caught by PC Plod than Hercule Poirot.

The term "mystery spinner" may not have been coined by Gideon Haigh but it was best and most appropriately used as the title of his wonderful biography of Jack Iverson. Everything about Iverson was a mystery, sometimes even to himself. Deeply insecure about his own special talent, he continually fretted that he had been "found out". Whether this was objectively true of Iverson is another question but Narine's inauspicious debut brings to mind Ajantha Mendis, widely considered to have been "found out" after a promising beginning.

Both Narine and Mendis bowl a "carrom" ball, as nominally did Iverson (although Haigh's description suggests that his huge hands created altogether more vigorous spin) and both have enjoyed success in T20 cricket on the sub-continent. But under polar opposite circumstances, a Test match in England, they have looked anything but mysterious.

Whilst Mendis has currently faded from view, that is not necessarily the fate that awaits Narine. For one thing they are actually quite different bowlers despite their signature deliveries. Mendis' bowling relies on a number of subtle variations and great accuracy. Big turn was never his thing. Narine by contrast is less accurate but really spins it. In a spell littered with short deliveries he extracted more turn with his stock off-break than Graeme Swann had done earlier in the day. And whilst his carrom ball may not have turned at Edgbaston, it only takes a couple of clicks to find evidence of it doing so, and sharply at that. Accuracy can be worked on, the ability to spin the ball hard is talent.

But what about the mystery? Once lost can it ever be regained? If we are talking mechanics, then in the age of video analysis, prolonged mystery is tough to achieve (although Ajmal is giving it a good shot). But mystery is more than mechanics and so is spin bowling. Although never referred to as such, Shane Warne is the greatest mystery spinner the world has ever known. He understood that mystery or deception, which is what we are really talking about, isn't found merely in the act of delivery but can be created anywhere and at anytime. In fact most of Warne's mystery wasn't even created on the pitch but in television interviews and press conferences, sowing the seeds of doubt in batsmen' with claims of new deliveries. He then used his natural talent to compound and reinforce these doubts on the field.

Sunil Narine is no Warne but the lesson remains the same. If he can instill doubt in a batsman's mind and keep it there his mystery will never be solved.