I can assure William Bown and Rabi Mehta that the experimental results
on swing and reverse swing of cricket balls have not sat unregarded in the
Aeronautics Library at Imperial College (‘The seamy side of swing bowling’,
21 August)
At the height of last year’s controversy surrounding Wasim Akram and
Waqar Younis and their alleged cheating, I presented an explanation of swing
and reverse swing, based on Mehta’s results, on BBC2‘s Newsnight.
Following the programme I did not receive a single inquiry from a cricketer
or a cricket administrator. I can only presume that the cricketing authorities
in this country want to go on believing the cheating theory and not the
scientific evidence.
This summer we invited a member of the England selectors to visit the
Department of Aeronautics to discuss these results, but he declined as he
was too busy. I hope that the renewed exposure given to the results by
Bown and Mehta’s excellent article will now stimulate some interest.
Peter Bearman Imperial College London
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