Swing bowling

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Swing bowling is a bowling technique in cricket, in which the ball is made to curve through the air. This is in the hope that the change in the ball's flight path will deceive the batter and cause them to play the ball incorrectly. A bowler who uses this technique is called a swing bowler.^[1] Swing bowling is generally classed as a type of fast bowling.

A swing bowling delivery is either an inswinger, where the ball curves in towards the batter, or an outswinger, where the ball curves away from the batter. A swing bowler often bowls a mixture of inswingers and outswingers, by changing how they hold the ball.

To make the ball swing, a bowling side will continually polish one side of the ball by applying sweat to it, as well as rubbing it against their clothing to shine it, while leaving the opposite side unshined. When the ball is relatively new and swinging conventionally, the airflow over the rough and shiny sides cause it to move in flight towards the rough side and away from the shiny side. Swing bowlers often use a subtly altered grip on the ball to accentuate this effect. Such swing bowling is usually effective when the ball is newer, before the shiny side becomes worn over the course of play. An older ball may be more useful for spin bowling or other forms of fast bowling. However, as the ball becomes more worn, it may reverse swing, where it swings in the opposite direction - towards the shiny side.

As swing bowling is heavily dependent on the condition of the ball, many ball tampering controversies have been related to it, where teams have tried to illegally alter the wear of the ball using materials such as sandpaper to produce additional swing.