NEW DELHI, Nov 13 (Reuters) - The art of reverse swing is fading from test cricket, but fast bowlers and coaches say fear of punishment after the 2018 'Sandpapergate' scandal explains only part of the decline.
The affair, which cost Steve Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft lengthy bans and heavy fines, cast its shadow over Australia again this week when Usman Khawaja revisited it in his autobiography.
Reverse swing occurs when an ageing ball, rubbed glossy on one side and roughed up on the other, bends late in its flight towards the polished face. It is the opposite of conventional swing. Producing it takes pace, ideally above 135kph, along with a strong wrist and a stable seam.
Pakistan's Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis were its undisputed masters, wielding it to devastating effect in the heat and dust of the subcontinent during the final decades of the 20th century.
Former Australia coach Justin Langer recently argued that 'Sandpapergate' had all but killed the craft by frightening players away from "preparing" the ball.
"I don't agree with that," former India player TA Sekar, a bowling guru at the MRF Pace Foundation in Chennai who has shaped the careers of Javagal Srinath and Zaheer Khan, told Reuters.
"There are many reasons why overall the ball is swinging less these days -- not just reverse swing. And it takes more than just a strip of sandpaper to generate reverse swing."
BALL PREPARATION
Former South Africa paceman Dale Steyn explained what it does take.
"In order to get the ball to reverse swing, there needs to be a certain amount of work that is done on the ball," the 43-year-old told Reuters.
"Whether you're throwing it in the dirt (or) a wicketkeeper is turning it in his gloves to get the one side roughed up, whether bowlers are going for a period of six to 10 overs, as we used to do, cross-seam, to get the ball as scuffed as possible, and then shine the hell out of the one side."
The line between preparation and cheating has long been thin. Steyn's former teammate Faf du Plessis was twice found guilty of ball-tampering, once for polishing the ball with saliva sweetened by a mint. In 2006, Pakistan forfeited the Oval test against England after being accused of ball tampering, a charge later dismissed by the ICC.
Steyn detected a nervousness among players in the wake of 'Sandpapergate' about working on the ball.
"Sometimes the ball gets hit high and lands on the field, and there's a piece of grass wedged up and pressed against it," he said.
"Players are scared that if they use their nail to pull that piece of grass off, someone might zoom in, take a picture, and say 'look at these guys, they're scratching the ball'.
"I think players are now too scared to even want to touch the ball, like 'keep that thing away from me. I don't want any bad publicity from my side'."
But paranoia alone is not killing the craft. Bowler-friendly pitches and a better-kept outfield have made it hard to legally roughen one side of the ball against the abrasive ground.
The ban on using saliva to polish the shiny side of the ball, introduced for health reasons during theCOVID pandemic, has also had an impact.
THE WOBBLE-SEAM FACTOR
Australia captain Pat Cummins, one of the game's elite fast bowlers, insisted reverse swing was still possible without bending the laws.
"I think a lot of it's actually conditions based," he said on Friday, againdenying any involvement in 'Sandpapergate'.
"Even in Australia, the (Sydney Cricket Ground) might reverse, the square is normally quite abrasive, but an Adelaide Oval won't, because it's always beautifully presented."
Sekar sees another culprit in the World Test Championship, launched in 2019.
"Test cricket has become more result-oriented. You have more tests ending inside three days. How do you generate reverse swing if the ball doesn't get old and rough?"
He also points to the rise of wobble-seam bowling in recent years, which has reduced the need for reverse swing altogether.
Pioneered by England pace great James Anderson and bowled with an angled seam, it makes the ball wobble and swerve just as unpredictably.
Moreover, fielding sides no longer have to wait for the ball to age, and can avoid venturing into the grey area of ball preparation, which may amount to tampering.
"Once Anderson showed how to do it, every English bowler started to bowl wobble-seam and it spread," Sekar said.
Still, the art has not vanished. Mark Wood's 5-40 against West Indies at Edgbaston two years ago and Josh Hazlewood's 6-49 in Durban last month were reverse swing bowling at its finest.
"There's a lot of conversations in change rooms around how to get reverse swing. Most of them totally fine. You're always trying to perfect it," Cummins added.
"We just did it in South Africa a couple of weeks ago. It might be 'do we come round the wicket?'. (Mitchell) Starc's very good at hitting one side of the ball. He'll try and bowl into the rough. We're talking about methods all the time."
Performances like Hazlewood's have convinced Sekar that reports of the craft's demise are greatly exaggerated.
"It's an art. Bowlers who have this skill will continue to trouble the batsmen. It will remain a factor, especially in the subcontinent," he said.
(Additional reporting by Nick Mulvenney in Sydney and Nick Said in Cape Town; editing by Toby Davis)
