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googly.

A ball, bowled by a leg-break bowler, that spins from off to leg (to a right-handed batsman), unlike a normal leg-break delivery.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈɡʉːɡli/Australia, New-Zealand/ˈɡuɡli/General-American
  1. A ball, bowled by a leg-break bowler, that spins from off to leg (to a right-handed batsman), unlike a normal leg-break delivery.

    His weakness in batting is against googly.
    He bowled a googly that sparked a shout for LBW.
Where this word comes from

Unknown; perhaps derived from googie (“an egg, in reference to the unusual direction of bounce”). Though the delivery was perfected and made famous by English cricketer Bernard Bosanquet, circa 1900, the term is recorded earlier in Australian English (1896).

adj/ˈɡʉːɡli/Australia, New-Zealand/ˈɡuɡli/General-American
  1. Bulging.

  2. Appearing to be amorous, flirtatious.

    sometimes · usually
Where this word comes from

Uncertain. Perhaps from goo-goo (“amorous”), or directly from goggle. Attested from 1901.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.