HOW TO SWINGA

SWINGA™ creator Aaron Lilly takes you through some quick tips to get your SWINGA™ Technique Ball swinging through the air like the best of them.

Watch the video to learn how to bowl both inswingers and outswingers, by hand and with the flinger. And because the SWINGA™ behaves and reacts like a regular cricket ball, you can bowl spin with it just like normal.

Getting it to swing

Wrist behind the ball, seam presented upright — exactly as you would with a leather ball, and the same applies with a sidearm. That is the whole trick, and it is also why the SWINGA is such a good teaching tool: if the wrist isn't right, the ball won't swing, so a bowler gets instant feedback without a coach standing over them.

The more you use it, the more you'll find the release that gets it moving. As the ball gets older it starts to reverse and swings even more.

If you want the most movement, use the 146 g. The 156 g swings a little less but comes off the bat closest to a real leather ball.

What you can use it with

Underarms, overarms and throwdowns by hand. All known flingers. A bowling machine, using the 146 g. And for the quickest throwers — the RoboArm, the RapidArm and the clear Sidearm — use the 156 g.

SWINGA Technique Balls in red, white, yellow and pink

The Science of Swing

You may notice the ball tends to swing away from the shiny side (conventional swing) when thrown or bowled slowly, but towards the shiny side (reverse swing) at higher pace. I'm no physicist, so when creating the SWINGA I wanted to understand why.

I reached out to my good friend Dr Callum Shakespeare, a fellow and senior lecturer at the Australian National University who has worked with the Climate and Fluid Physics Research Group since 2015. His explanation:

"There are two types of drag you have to think about: laminar flow and viscous drag, which applies when things are moving slowly, and turbulent wake and drag, which applies when things are moving fast. The interesting thing about the two drags is they will act in opposite ways on the two sides of the ball. The dimpled side will have a bigger laminar viscous drag, because it is rougher, but a smaller turbulent wake drag, because the flow detachment occurs further towards the back of the ball — this is the golf ball effect. The path of the ball will tend to move towards the side that experiences the larger drag, because that side is slowed down relative to the other.

Throw it slowly, laminar drag dominates, and the ball moves towards the rough side. Throw it fast, turbulent drag dominates, and the ball moves towards the smooth side."

There was also a great study by Rabindra Mehta, sports aerodynamics consultant and NASA scientist, explaining the three forms of swing: conventional, reverse and contrast. Read it here.