Game on...

This article is written by Rajnikanth - a sports fan and a tennis fanatic.  He is on a personal mission to watch ATP events in every place possible :-) and is hoping that his god 'Roger Federer' wins a few more tournaments in 2014.  Rajni is a banker and is based in the middle east.  You can reach Rajni on his email - rajnikanth_r@yahoo.com


The new year was rung in with greetings from players across the world, followed by some key announcements. The new season is already a fortnight old and there have been plenty of excitement and several developments - on the Tennis court and off it!
Rafael Nadal continued his good run since his comeback in Feb 2013 but also suffered a rare loss at the hands of his compatriot, Davis Cup team mate and good friend David Ferrer in the exhibition tournament at Abu Dhabi and finished third. However, the following week, he won the Qatar Open, earning 500 ATP points and extending his lead over Novak Djokovic who continues to hold the second spot in th…

Recently we had the opportunity to meet with L Siva – former Indian leg-spinner and cricket commentator.  We were talking about Indian fast bowling and why Mohammed Shami was able to reverse swing the old ball a lot better than Bhuvaneshwar Kumar.  Siva felt that the slightly side-arm/round arm action of Shami seems to aid reverse swing much better than the conventional upright straight-arm action.  Siva went on to point out all bowlers who reversed the old ball well – Akram, Malinga, Waqar, etc bowled with a slinging side-arm action.  This set me thinking –
In test cricket, we play with the same ball for 80 overs.A new ball retains its shine (or newness) for 20 overs at best.The ball usually starts reverse swinging at around 40 overs or so.In effect, we get 20 overs of regular swing and a good 40 overs of reverse, give or take a few.So logically, we need more reverse swing bowlers (side arm) than the regular swing bowlers (straight arm).Then why is it that our coaches keep correcting …