Abdul Qadir kept leg spin alive when cricket had written it off
In the late 1970s wrist spin looked like a dying art, squeezed out by pace. Then an imam's son from Lahore came bounding to the crease with a leg-break, a topspinner, a flipper and two different googlies. Abdul Qadir bamboozled England, inspired a young Shane Warne, and Graham Gooch later rated him even finer than Warne.
Qadir was born on 15 September 1955 into a poor family in the Dharampura area of Lahore, the second of four children. He started out as a batsman at school, played for his local gymkhana and studied at Government College University before his first-class debut in 1975. Over two decades for Lahore, Punjab and Habib Bank he took 960 wickets in 209 matches.
His Test career began on his home ground, the Gaddafi Stadium, on 14 December 1977. He managed just one wicket that day, but in the next match he bowled into the rough left by Bob Willis to take six for 44, and finished as the series' leading wicket-taker. By the 1982-83 visit of Australia he was a force, claiming 22 wickets, a Pakistani record against that opponent, as Pakistan swept all three Tests.
England suffered most. In 1987 he took ten wickets at The Oval to secure a series win in England, and three months later, back in Lahore, he collected 30 wickets in three Tests, including nine for 56 in an innings. Those remain Pakistan's best Test innings figures and the best by anyone against England. His animated appeals delighted crowds, though they sometimes landed him in trouble with umpires.
Across 67 Tests he took 236 wickets, alongside 104 one-day internationals, five of them as captain, and he played in the 1983 and 1987 World Cups. After retiring he commentated and served as Pakistan's chief selector until resigning in 2009. He died on 6 September 2019, and the ICC inducted him into its Hall of Fame in November 2022.
Source: Abdul Qadir (cricketer)
