Last month's Pakistani elections saw the first democratic transition of power..... and the winner waaaas...... Nawaz Sharif, who ruled once before, was deposed by the army and sent into exile. To the outside onlooker it seemed that the most high-profile candidate was Imran Kahn, one of Pakistan's great cricketers. Many would agree today that Pakistan produces cricketers of flair and talent and, if it wasn't for its dysfunctional politics, could probably be at the top of the world cricket. Imran was the cricket captain who schooled the wonderful bowlers Sarfraz Nawaz and Waqar Younis in the miracle of reverse swing. Up till then conventional swing was produced by shining the ball vigorously on one side to make it move in the opposite direction. In the right conditions you could shift it a lot through the air even at quite low speeds. I remember at junior school, we had one bowler who conjured up such prodigious inswingers that a leg slip standing next to the wicket-keeper could take the ball. Reverse swing occurs when the ball is quite beat up and moves in the same direction as the shine, such as it is. It also requires more speed, in excess of 80mph is good. Imran bought this talent to the Pakistani election. He took on the established parties and created a media storm. But his reverse swing in politics was probably too elitist to make serious inroads into the popular vote. Maybe, if he's prepared to continue the grind of constructing a political party he may yet prove a winning force in the next election, if the army doesn't intervene again. The QSL is from Radio Pakistan, Lahore heard with a local broadcast on AM one sunset at Partridge Point near Simon's Town, sitting in a car and using a short antenna up in a cleft above the sea.
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