![]() ![]() Within four years he was bowling the Australian Test side to victory over England in the Ashes series of 1950-51. Using a unique technique he appears to have perfects with a ping-pong ball during wartime service in Papua New Guinea, he doubled back his middle finger and found he could bowl leg breaks, top spinners and googlies, every one dropped on a perfect length and impossible to pick. 'Every now and then,' wrote one journalist, 'there comes a man who can do the right thing the wrong way round.' Iverson took up cricket, at the advanced age of 31, as capriciously as he left it – joining a club 3rd XI in Melbourne one day, and instantly announcing himself as the most prodigious and improbable spinner of a cricket ball. The story of Jack Iverson is one of the most remarkable in the history of cricket. But for four years he was the best spin bowler in the world. He was a clumsy fielder, and a hopeless batsman. He died in obscurity, by his own hand, at the age of only 58. ![]() For most of his life he was an unexceptional estate agent in Australia. ![]() It is no mystery that today the name of Jack Iverson is virtually unknown. ![]()
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