17 Facts about Sarfraz Nawaz - The Purveyor of Reverse Swing

Sarfraz Nawaz brought a defining edge to the art of fast bowling. He stood tall at six-foot-six-inches and his physique was described “as strong as a cart-horse.” His ability to swing and seam the ball in both directions and introduced the art of reverse swing to the cricket world. It was this art that he later passed on to Imran Khan who in turn transferred it to the glorious duo of Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis who made it famous in the 1980’s and 1990’s.

Initially, commentators did not realise it was reverse swing at that time and thought that he had an uncanny ability to move the old ball in the air. Nawaz was a good lower-order batsman and a powerful striker of the ball particularly when driving and averaged over 40 in a series on three occasions.

1. Birth:

Sarfraz Nawaz was born on 1st December 1948 and was raised in Mozang, Lahore.

2. Education:

Sarfraz Nawaz did his matriculation from a public school in his hometown Mozang in 1962 and secured second division marks.

3. Family business:

His father, Malik Muhammad Nawaz, was a contractor. Sarfraz also started his career as a contractor for the family’s construction company in 1965. Building a cricket stadium for Government College University in Lahore was his first construction project but they had to abandon it because of the war in 1965.

4. Accidental introduction to cricket:

As work on the construction of the cricket stadium came to an abrupt halt, some boys began playing cricket there. Sarfraz, who was in-charge of the project, went to the boys to try and convince them to abandon the place. But instead, those boys introduced the game to him and that was the moment the master of the reverse swing got hooked to this game. The boys included the likes of Aftab Gul, Waseem Raja, Saleem Altaf, Shafiq Ahmed and Naeem Altaf. All of them, except Naeem Altaf, went on to play for Pakistan later.

5. Club cricket:

Sarfraz Nawaz joined Mozang Link Cricket Club and played a handful of matches before he was chosen as captain of the Punjab University cricket team.

6. First mentors:

Abdul Rab, who coached at Friends Cricket Club in Lahore, was Sarfraz Nawaz’s first mentor. Later Iqbal Butt, the director of sports at Punjab University, encouraged him a lot.

7. County stint before Test debut:

In the year 1968-69, the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) team was on a tour to Pakistan and the then-Northamptonshire captain Roger Prideaux was a member of that team. Sarfraz was a net bowler and he bowled at Prideaux in the practice nets in Lahore before the first game. Impressed by his performance, Prideaux reportedly told him, “Sarfraz, you can swing the ball either way almost at will” and offered Sarfraz a contract to play for Northamptonshire even before he had made his Test debut.

8. Test debut:

After playing just five first-class games, Sarfraz made his Test debut against England in the third match of the 1968-69 series. He bowled 34 wicket-less overs in the match which was called off as only two days of play was possible. Eventually, he was dropped for 4 years after his debut.

9. The invincible tour:

Sarfraz Nawaz was a part of the Pakistan team for the 1974 tour of England, which was the most memorable one for Pakistan, as they didn’t lose a single match on the tour and thus became the only second side to do so (the first being the Don Bradman’s invincible Australians from 1948).

10. Spell from hell:

Sarfraz is more remembered for his ‘spell from hell’ bowling performance of 9/86 against Australia at MCG in 1979. Sarfraz’s greatest moment of triumph came at Melbourne, in the first Test against Australia in March 1979. Chasing 382 for victory, Australia was sitting comfortable at 305 for three, with Allan Border and Kim Hughes looking inseparable, having already added 177. It was now when Sarfraz produced his dream spell. The only wicket he could not take was of Graham Yallop who was run out. Aussies were miraculously bowled for 310.

11. Rivalry with other fast bowlers:

Sarfraz Nawaz had the habit of repeatedly bowling bouncers at other fast bowlers such as Jeff Thomson and Joel Garner. One interesting incident happened in 1975 during a tour game when Sarfraz was playing for the Northants against the touring Australians in England. Thomson was firing bouncers at him repeatedly. Usually, at that time, fast bowlers avoided bowling bouncers to other fast bowlers out of mutual respect. But, Thompson did not mind doing that. Finally, an angry Sarfraz shouted at Thomson and said, “There is a grave vacant at the local cemetery.” And, when Australia came to bat, Sarfraz took his revenge by dismissing Thomson off a bouncer.

12. Personal life:

Sarfraz Nawaz married Rani, one of the most successful actresses of the Pakistan, in 1982. Unfortunately, she died in 1992 due to Cancer after spending nearly a decade with him. In an interview, Malik said he knew that she had cancer when they had married.

13. Movie offer:

Given his good looks, Sarfraz Khan was first offered a role in a movie when he was in England in 1974, but he declined since acting was not his forte. Then in the late ’70s, his friend Younis Malik, the famous Pakistani film director, offered him and his actress wife Rani lead roles in his film. But, this time again, he refused.

14. Multiple retirements:

Sarfraz Nawaz announced his retirement from cricket on multiple occasions but came out of it every time before finally retiring in 1984. He can be credited with starting the often-repeated Pakistani tradition of retiring multiple times.

15. Post-retirement:

He worked as a fast-bowling consultant at the National Cricket Academy in Lahore and helped unearth talents like Shoaib Akhtar, Azhar Mahmood, Shabbir Ahmed, and Abdul Razzaq. In 2006, Sarfraz conducted a week-long fast bowling clinic for Delhi’s bowlers ahead of the Ranji Trophy season. He was also a consultant for the PCB.

16. Foray into politics:

Sarfraz Nawaz has acted as a Member of the Parliament, an outspoken cricket commentator and a fighter against match-fixing. According to him, he has even been threatened by armed men because of his comments about gamblers and fixers.

Also Read – 16 Cricketers who turned the Political way

17. An amusing tale:

By the time Pakistan toured the West Indies in 1976-77, Sarfraz was a senior player in the side with eight years of international experience behind him. There were a few youngsters in the side like Javed Miandad and Haroon Rasheed, for whom this was the first tour to the Caribbean Islands, and travelling abroad was still a new experience. Once on that tour at a dinner, the menu had an item “Mountain Chicken”. Sarfraz had been there before and knew what it was in reality. Miandad and Rasheed ordered it, wrongly thinking it was chicken. When both were finished eating the “Mountain Chicken”, Sarfraz asked the boys, “Do you know what you have just eaten is a frog?” They thought he was joking and asked the waiter, who confirmed it was a big frog of the Caribbean. This made both youngsters feel nauseous.