WHAT a showman Shane Warne is. Living under the constant media glare that is part of a life on the global stage, he loved the attention that he got, and his parting shot confirms that he was able during that time to build a knack for knowing when to do what. His decision to bow out at the end of the Ashes took everyone by surprise, and that is what he would have loved the most, I am sure.

Regardless of his showman spirit, there is hardly a soul on the planet who would argue against Shane Warne being among the very, very exalted few who have over the years, decades and centuries graced the game with their presence. Cliches like being in the hall of fame, or being a legend, or being in a class of his own, and such others would serve no purpose at all. In ways more than one, he has been truly and simply Shane Warne. He deserves all the plaudits, applause, compliments and cheers that have come his way in the wake of his retirement announcement.

Before we move further in waxing eloquence, let me strike a somewhat discordant note here. It has often been suggested that Warne was the one who re-invented the art of leg-spin bowling in the modern era. Most of the statements and quotes that have appeared in the last few days since his retirement announcement have also credited him for having done that. I beg to differ. Abdul Qadir, to my eyes, is the one who should be given credit for this. He started his career in the 1977-78 season and hung up his cricketing boots in 1990-91, just when Warne was knocking at the doors of international cricket. And Abdul Qadir was no muck when it came to turning the ball either way with highly impressive accuracy in terms of pitching the ball in the right areas.

Before him, one will have to struggle to find a decent individual who could bowl the traditional leg spin, googly or the top-spinner. The famed Indian spinning quartet had none of the sort. In Pakistan there were the likes of Intikhab Alam, Mushtaq Mohammad and even Wasim Raja, but none of them qualified for being a true leg-spinner. At best, they were practitioners of a dying art, but didn’t have the accuracy or the results to save it from death. Away from the subcontinent, there were a number of trundlers and rollers around in sides like England, Australia, the West Indies and New Zealand, but there was hardly a proper Test standard spinner. And that exactly was the reason behind the gradual death of the art. Part-timers and trundlers were ruining the reputation of the art because every now and then they were thrashed to all parts of the park and in the modern game where One Day cricket is a hard reality, they had no role to play.

Abdul Qadir changed it all. He is the one who should be credited with the re-invention of the art of leg spin bowling. It was his skill and the manner in which Imran Khan, his captain, conceived his part in the Pakistani lineup all through the 1980s, that together revived leg-spin.

Unlike Abdul Qadir who had no role model to follow, Warned had the luxury of watching all through his teen and formative years batsmen being dazzled and bamboozled around the world by leg-spin. As such, one can easily pick the individual who actually re-invented the art.

This takes nothing — absolutely nothing — away from Warne. He took it to newer, greater and much more impressive heights than anyone in the history of the game. And it is perfectly fair to call him a better and more effective spinner than Abdul Qadir in the final analysis. I personally have been privileged to watch him bowl, but he didn’t re-invent the art of leg-spin. Abdul Qadir did that.