How Reverse Swing Is Really Made
Saad explains the physics and the craft of reverse swing, how a fielding side looks after one side of the ball, what is legal and what is not, and why Pakistan became its home.
Forty Years of Pitches with a Rawalpindi Groundsman
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Show notes
The man who makes the pitch
Riaz Ahmed has prepared pitches at Rawalpindi since the stadium opened, including for Tests, the PSL and a famous draw that nobody enjoyed. He tells Saad how a strip is built from clay and grass, what the roller does to pace, why day four turns, and how it feels when the whole country blames you for a flat wicket.
- Clay, grass and the watering schedule
- What captains ask for and what they get
- Why a pitch changes from day one to day five
- The broken roller before a Test
- The flat wicket that made headlines and the phone calls after
Next midweek episode, why a left-arm spinner bowls a different game.
Transcript
Welcome back to Reverse Swing Diaries, I am Saad Farooqi. This is the weekend edition, where we sit down and talk for as long as it takes. Today my guest is a man most of you have never heard of and every cricketer in Pakistan respects. Riaz Ahmed has been head groundsman at Rawalpindi since the stadium opened. He has had captains begging him, boards blaming him, and once, the morning before a Test, a roller that simply refused to start. We talk about how a pitch is actually built, why it behaves one way on day one and another on day five, and what it is like when the entire country decides your wicket was too flat. There is a lot of laughter and some very honest answers. You are listening on Witspeak Podcasts. Pull up a chair.
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