Akram’s words of wisdom to Zaheer Khan

Zaheer was working on the bowling tips by the Wasim Akram who had asked him to completely redo his bowling style.

Zaheer Khan was roundly booed by Indian supporters at the MCG for the flurry of no-balls but apparently there was a reason to it.

Zaheer was working on the bowling tips by the Pakistani legend Wasim Akram who had asked him to completely redo his bowling style for the present tour of Australia.

Akram had advised Zaheer to understand that his method of swinging the delivery, as he did so brilliantly in England this summer, would not work in Australia.

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“It wouldn’t help if he was to just come and release the delivery in Australia as he did in England. There is a different method to obtaining swing in this part of the world”, Akram said.

Zaheer was asked to run in quicker than he normally does and instead of just releasing the ball, he should look to hit the deck on Australian pitches.

Zaheer worked on the advice and turned in a brilliant performance at the MCG in both the innings, never mind there were a dozen no-balls in Australia’s second innings.

Even though he grabbed just a wicket in Australia’s second innings, he troubled all Australian batsmen as he had done during his four-wicket haul in the first innings.

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The only trouble was that in order to run-in and hit the crease hard, Zaheer was overstepping time and again.

One such transgression cost him the wicket of Andrew Symonds. The hefty all-rounder was bowled but much to Zaheer’s disappointment, the right arm of umpire Billy Bowden was already stretched out in a signal for no-ball.