Old DOHS coach Khaled Mahmud took the 'spin-only' route to success, an unconventional move in the extent to which it has been implemented. It was his team's needs that brought about this new mechanism which has exposed a lack of faith in pace bowlers.

At the top of the Dhaka Premier League points table sits Victoria Sporting Club but they are only ahead of Old DOHS because of a head-to-head advantage as both are equal on 16 points from nine games. Old DOHS's tremendous run made everyone sit up and take notice, and it was the bowling line-up that took everyone by surprise.

In the last three games where they defeated big guns Gazi Tank, Abahani and Mohammedan, Mahmud employed an all-spin attack, literally from the first ball. Two of the their trio of spinners — left-armers Nabil Samad, Enamul Haque and off-spinner Shuvogoto Hom Chowdhury — took the new ball. In all, they have used spin to open the bowling from the fourth game against Cricket Coaching School when left-armers Saeed Anwar and Zohaib Khan took up the task.

Mahmud has been encouraged to take this decision after his pace bowlers -- Rizwan Haider, Mohammad Sharif and Ziaur Rahman -- didn't deliver the desired results. One look at his roster and the former national captain was convinced that Shuvogoto's off-spin could contain batsmen like Tamim Iqbal and that Nabil would be able to handle the shiny white ball. Breakthroughs came thick and fast as the opposition lost two or more wickets in the first ten overs every time the spinners started off. "I think it was the third or fourth match when we decided to try this method," said Mahmud. "I was really impressed seeing Shuvogoto bowl off-spin so I told him to have a go at Tamim Iqbal early. He got him in the fourth over."

"I also had Nabil Samad in the wings so I thought, 'why not play three left-arm spinners?"'

Against Abahani, Nabil and Enamul didn't take wickets early but it was skipper Mohammad Ashraful and Faisal Hossain who were successful in taking out the openers by the eleventh over.

The trend has also been replicated by some of the other top sides; Shakib Al Hasan (of Victoria) opening against Abahani, Nasir (of Gazi Tank) opening against Victoria and Mohammedan. Abahani, Mohammedan and Sheikh Jamal Dhanmondi Club have all tried spinners with the new ball.

All this obviously means that pace bowling has taken a major beating this Premier League season. Out of the 23 bowlers who have taken a minimum of ten wickets, only six are pacers with PeterTrego of Abahani leading the way.

The Englishman's 19 wickets is, at this stage, joint highest with Mohammedan leftarm spinner Yasim Mortuza, an anomaly especially given the poor performance of most of his brigade. The Somerset man has accuracy and variation (which is also accurate), using the slower ball more regularly than the others.

"I don't see any of the local guys bowling the slower ball as regularly or accurately as

Trego does. He is much disciplined," said Mahmud, who went on to point out a few flaws in the development of a fast bowler.

"For precision, you need to practice a lot. I think we need pace bowling camps and the bowlers themselves have to practice a lot more than they do these days.

"When I used to get hit, I would devise new ways so that I can keep the batsmen quiet. I developed cutters, but these days I don't see anyone trying anything different and being accurate with it," hesaid.