It is widely regarded as the greatest cricket delivery of all time but two decades after sending down the Ball of the Century, Shane Warne admits he still sees it as a fluke.
The year's Ashes series, starting at Trent Bridge on Wednesday, coincides with the 20th anniversary of Warne's astonishing dismissal of Mike Gatting at Old Trafford – with his first ball in Test cricket in England.
As Australia and England prepare to go head to head again, the leg-spin great has re-visited the occasion that despite 707 other Test wickets in a remarkable career remains his signature.
"The whole 'Gatting ball' thing, I suppose everyone says it's the Ball of the Century etc, which is a pretty proud sort of thing. It's pretty cool and sort of makes me feel pretty humble about how lucky I was to be in that thing and how lucky it was to happen. He could have easily missed it or nicked it," Warne recalls.
Australian bowler Shane Warne (C) and keeper Ian Healy celebrate after Mike Gatting was clean bowled by Warne with his first ball on the second day of the first Test, June 4, 1993.Credit: Reuters
"And I never did it again. It just shows you it really was a fluke, and it was meant to be."
Warne said he had been largely kept under wraps in the lead-up matches to the Test series, implored by captain Allan Border not to give any tricks away.
"I remember the Worcestershire game leading up to the first Test match, Allan Border told me 'just bowl leg breaks to Graeme Hick and a few of the guys in their side, because they could be big players in the Ashes. We don't want them to see too much of you'," he said.
As for the ball to Gatting itself, which drifted and pitched outside leg stump and then careered across the English batsman into his off bail, Warne recalls:
Oooh, that's a good one! England's Mike Gatting is bowled by Shane Warne in Manchester.Credit: Getty Images
"I was a bit nervous actually. My thought process was 'just try and get your rhythm first, try and spin a couple of big leg breaks first to get inside their head that the wicket is turning.
"As soon as it released out of my hand it felt really good. I didn't realise, I don't think, until we looked up at the screen...I remember us all standing in the middle saying 'that was a pretty good ball'. Then I looked up and I went 'geez'. And I was feeling pretty good after that, because it was a pretty good cherry."
Mike Gatting after being bowled by Australia's Shane Warne in the first test.
Gatting, on the wrong end of the extraordinary leg break, is however content to be central to such a prominent episode in Ashes history.
"Had he bowled a long hop and I'd smashed it for four, one wonders what might have happened. But he bowled a ball that had people in my dressing room certainly sitting round the tea table watching at tea time," he said.
The ball of the century.
"It was one of those sort of things that possibly changed the series. There are lots of bits of folklore and to be part of it is always a pleasure."
The Warne and Gatting interviews will feature on cricket.com.au from Tuesday as the first in a Cricket Australia digital series chronicling 13 great Ashes moments.