BEIJING: Shane Warne may have inspired a generation of young cricketers trying to perfect the art leg-spin in backyards across Australia, but even he may be surprised to learn of his contribution to the unorthodox rise of a Hong Kong cricketing hopeful.

Introduced to cricket by his younger sister just two years earlier, Ming Li was a 15-year-old seam bowler looking at clips of fast bowlers on YouTube in 2006 when he chanced upon one of Warne's most memorable deliveries.

Bowling from around the wicket to Andrew Strauss in the Edgbaston Test of the 2005 Ashes, Warne ripped a dipping, viciously turning delivery that landed well wide of the left-hander's off stump, but spat back across him and hit his leg stump.

The next day Li asked his coach to teach him how to bowl leg-spin. "It looked amazing, so I just tried to learn," he said.