Melbourne, July 06: Australian pacer Brett Lee has revealed that he managed to get devastating reverse swing against the England Lions after employing an Indian strategy.
Lee bagged six wickets against the Lions to stake a strong claim for a place in the starting eleven of the first Ashes test.
During Australia’s tour of India last October, pacers Ishant Sharma and Zaheer Khan bowled with a scrambled seam so the ball would deteriorate and start to reverse swing quicker and Australia is planning to use the same strategy against England in the first Test.
“Normally in Australia with greener wickets and greener outfields we tend to try to bowl seam up for the first 20 or 30 overs and then see what happens after that. Over here in England and in a place like the subcontinent, it is a little bit different,” Lee said.
“We thought the first three or four overs, we would just see if the ball swings, but it didn’t swing a lot. So then we changed it around and bowled a bit across the seam to try to scuff it up and it started to go (reverse) after about 10 or 12 overs.
“We have worked with (bowling coach) Troy Cooley on different techniques to get the ball to swing. We have been working hard and hopefully that will pay dividends in the first Test,” he was quoted as saying by the Australian.
—–PTI