Cricket would have been poorer had it not been for the contribution of Abdul Qadir. The art of leg-spin bowling was dying during the decade of the 70s and it seemed that there would never be another leg spinner in the coming. Qadir ushered in a renaissance that made leg spin bowling a cherished art form. His secret was that he possessed six different deliveries in an over. The flipper and the top-spinner were Qadir's two different varieties of the googly and many were left flummoxed.

He made his debut against England at Hyderabad in 1978. In the second innings, he took 6/44 as Pakistan looked like stealing victory. However, England managed to hang on for a draw. Things went slightly downward for Qadir after that series. On the return tour in 1982, injuries plagued him and he proved to be ineffective in the matches that he played.

In the series against Australia in 1982, Qadir regained his lost form by snapping up 11 wickets at Faisalabad as Australia hurtled to an innings defeat. Throughout the series, Qadir troubled the Australians with his variations as he finished up with 22 wickets in three matches. Pakistan whitewashed the Australians 3-0 and Qadir was establishing himself as a potent force. Imran Khan transformed Qadir into a brilliant bowler during his captaincy and he always managed to get the best out of him.

His bowling even made the mighty West Indian team clueless during the 80's. The fact that West Indies could not get over Pakistan during their period of dominance is partly due to Qadir's leg spinners. His most memorable performance came at Faisalabad when he tore through the West Indies top order in the second innings. His 6/16 bundled the West Indies out for just 53 runs. He troubled the West Indies throughout that series as he and Imran Khan finished the series as the joint highest wicket takers with 18 wickets apiece.

England simply had no clue to Qadir's leg-breaks. Out of the five ten wicket hauls taken in his career, four have come against England while out of the 15 five wicket hauls, eight were against them. Two glorious moments stand out for Qadir during the 1987 season. Against England at the Oval, Pakistan notched up 708. Qadir ran through the England batting in the first innings by snapping up 7/96 . However, England managed to hang on and draw the match with a gritty performance in the second innings. In the return leg played in November, Qadir's moment of glory arrived when in front of his home crowd in Lahore, he picked up 9/56 as Pakistan notched up an innings victory. These figures continue to remain the best bowling figures by a Pakistani bowler and this prompted Graham Gooch, the England opener, to call him the best leg spinner ever.

Qadir was a fighter to the core. He also was a handy bat lower down the order. He once thumped Courtney Walsh for 13 runs in the last over of the match to give Pakistan a one wicket victory in the 1987 World Cup match at Lahore. With the emergence of Mushtaq Ahmed, Qadir retired from cricket in 1993. He ran a private cricket academy in Lahore and he mentored Mushtaq and Danish Kaneria admirably. He became the chief selector of the PCB in 2008 but resigned after six months.

Fun Fact: Abdul Qadir is known as the dancing bowler due to his peculiar bowling style.

By Siddharth Vishwanathan