A video clip of Wasim Akram bowling out former Australian opener Michael Slater has sparked a wave of nostalgia online, with former South Africa pacer Dale Steyn joining the fray.
Cricket.com.au shared the clip with the caption, “A beautiful delivery from Wasim Akram, one of the finest exponents of swing bowling we’ve ever seen.”
The footage shows Akram sending down a sharp inswinging delivery that cleaned up Slater’s stumps.
Steyn, the former South Africa fast bowler, responded to the post with a comment that leaned fully into the nostalgia of the clip.
“The sound of the stump mic, the stickerless stumps, the old school gray nicolls bat, swinging kookaburra. The nostalgia. That’s cricket!” Steyn wrote.
Akram remains one of the most celebrated fast bowlers in the sport’s history. Known as the “Sultan of Swing,” the Pakistan left-armer built a formidable reputation on his ability to move the ball both ways at pace, along with a mastery of reverse swing that few bowlers of his era could match.
Across a career spanning 104 Test matches, Akram took 414 wickets, including 25 five-wicket hauls. He was equally destructive in the shorter format, claiming 502 wickets in 356 ODIs, a tally that remains one of the highest in one-day cricket history. He also took over 1,000 wickets in first-class cricket.
Steyn himself has long spoken about growing up idolising Akram and modelling parts of his own game on the Pakistani great, including his use of reverse swing during his playing days for South Africa.
