Well Fielded

Live Discussion: Asia Cup

Amer Siddiqui — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 04:00:26 +0000

Continuing with what has now become more of a regular feature here at this blog, here’s another blank post for the in-game discussion … let’s just use this space for the first two Pakistan games as they take on Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. India too takes on the same oppositions first so perhaps add those in the mix as well. Of course we’ll create a separate thread for the India-Pakistan encounter and who knows if Ahmad or I get some time we might even preview the big game separately.

Enjoy the games and with it, lets keep the debates rolling …

Asia Cup 2012: Preview

AG — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 21:46:46 +0000

ODIs, especially in the shape of triangular and quadrangular cups, were dying even before T20s came along. Given today’s over-crowded international calendars with bilateral series alongside ICC tournaments and with the T20 leagues springing everywhere, it really is a surprise that Asia Cup has lasted for as long as it has and refuses to die.

The one single reason I can give for its survival is that it offers at least one game of the greatest sporting rivalry alive – the India-Pakistan cricket match. I mean there is nothing else in the tournament … it hardly lasts for ten days, nobody plays the other more than once (compare it to the on-going triangular CB Series) and if this hasn’t convinced you enough, have a look at the schedule … even the final is on a week-day, only to ensure that the Pakistan-India contest falls on a Sunday. In fact the scheduling of this game towards the end suggests that it will either play as a semi-final to decide who goes on (if Sri Lanka has already beaten both) or a dress-rehearsal for the final itself (if both of them have already won their earlier games).

With Pakistan and India not playing each other so often otherwise, Asian Cricket Council (ACC) surely benefits and thus is able to successfully stage this event every now and then. I say “every now and then” because there is no particular order or agreed slot in the international calendar for this event but the ACC arranges it whenever they can get the four Test playing Asian countries to agree. They have tried playing the likes of UAE and Hong Kong alongside as well but of late it’s just been the big four that have featured and the event also making a more regular bi-annual appearance since the turn of the century (except a missed event in 2006). Here below is a quick history of the Asia Cup.

If you just glanced at the history table above, look at it once again … Sri Lanka, quite remarkably, has featured in every single final of this tournament since its inception in 1984. India might not have reached as many finals but they still are the most successful team (having won the tournament five times, while Sri Lanka has won four). Pakistan hasn’t seen much success amongst its Asian counterparts, reaching the final only twice and winning just once over the last 28 years.

Unfortunately, I see history repeating itself this time around as well and can’t see beyond another India-Sri Lanka final. With the batting woes highlighted in the recent England series, lack of any application whatsoever and absence of smart cricketing brains from our squad, I just can’t see Pakistan getting past India or Sri Lanka.

The pitches are going to be flat, the weather hot (and humid too) in Mirpur. All games are day-night, so toss will become all important again … teams batting first will certainly have an advantage. And don’t be too happy about India taking a beating down-under recently as back in the sub-continent they’re always a different unit.

Here are the four competing squads:

Bangladesh

Imrul Kayes, Nazimuddin, Jahurul Islam, Mushfiqur Rahim, Shakib Al Hasan, Mahmudullah, Nasir Hossain, Mashrafe Mortaza, Abdur Razzak, Elias Sunny, Nazmul Hossain, Shafiul Islam, Shahadat Hossain, Anamul Haque
In: Nazimuddin, Jahurul Islam, Mashrafe Mortaza, Shahadat Hossain, Anamul Haque
Out: Alok Kapali, Naeem Islam, Rubel Hossain, Shahriar Nafees
Reserves: Tamim Iqbal, Shuvagata Hom, Farhad Reza, Enamul Haque, Abul Hasan

Sri Lanka

Mahela Jayawardene (capt), Angelo Mathews (vice-capt), Tillakaratne Dilshan, Upul Tharanga, Kumar Sangakkara (wk), Dinesh Chandimal, Lahiru Thirimanne, Thisara Perera, Farveez Maharoof, Sachithra Senanayake, Nuwan Kulasekara, Lasith Malinga, Seekkuge Prasanna, Suranga Lakmal
In: Seekkuge Prasanna, Suranga Lakmal
Out: Rangana Herath, Dhammika Prasad, Chanaka Welegedara

India

MS Dhoni (capt & wk), Virat Kohli (vice-capt), Sachin Tendulkar, Gautam Gambhir, Rohit Sharma, Suresh Raina, Manoj Tiwary, Ravindra Jadeja, R Ashwin, Praveen Kumar, Vinay Kumar, Rahul Sharma, Yusuf Pathan, Irfan Pathan, Ashok Dinda
In: Yusuf Pathan, Ashok Dinda
Out: Virender Sehwag, Zaheer Khan, Umesh Yadav, Parthiv Patel

Pakistan

Misbah-ul-Haq (capt), Mohammad Hafeez, Nasir Jamshed, Younis Khan, Umar Akmal, Hammad Azam, Asad Shafiq, Shahid Afridi, Azhar Ali, Sarfraz Ahmed (wk), Saeed Ajmal, Abdur Rehman, Umar Gul, Aizaz Cheema, Wahab Riaz
In: Nasir Jamshed, Sarfraz Ahmed
Out: Shoaib Malik, Imran Farhat, Adnan Akmal
Reserves: Ahmed Shehzad, Rahat Ali, Bilawal Bhatti, Afaq Rahim

It is a little funny that everyone else almost always announce a vice-captain as well, which we never seem to have even during tours. (Bangladesh hasn’t announced a captain yet, but then they too have said a captain and vice-captain will be announced shortly). And no one else ever announces reserves, which effectively for them is everyone left back (again, Bangladesh is an exception, probably picking our bad habits) but we for some reason always have an elite backup list of some sort, called reserves. We have seen too many talented names pop up in such lists but they somehow almost always fail to reach the first teams and then in time we see new names in those reserves while others disappear. Anyone knows Rahat Ali, Bilawal Bhatti or Afaq Rahim? I will be surprised if any of the three are given a chance in the actual team and next time you will see three new such names.

All the negativity aside, I am actually looking forward to this tournament. Yes, the team has disappointed us against England recently and no major changes have been made to warrant anything different from them but we have managed to get rid of some sifarishis at least. And then it is the first assignment for our newly appointed coach, Dav Whatmore (with Julien Fountain also back as fielding coach) … and finally of course there is that small game on 18th March to look forward to as well.

Attention: ACC

Before I end, I have a suggestion for the Asian Cricket Council. Please convert this Asia cup into a T20 tournament and increase the no. of teams to eight. Before you jump to any conclusions, wait a second and listen to my whole suggestion … ICC has agreed to hold World T20 every two years and the way it stands, it’s going to be held the same year as Asia Cup. So converting this into a T20 tournament and allowing the four Asian countries to send in two teams each (that’s what I meant by eight teams), will allow the four boards to prepare for the World T20 that year. Each can send the first team and then also a team of reserves to get the youngsters a chance to prove their talent and with it a chance to break into the senior team. The fans will get to watch the exciting T20 cricket instead of the rather longish ODIs which in current circumstances and with flat pitches depend a lot on a single toss, and we will get to watch our second-in-line upcoming players in action as well. With two teams fielded by each country, ICC won’t sanction this as an international tournament but so what? At least it will give the Asian four to prepare really well for the World T20 by trying different combinations, and with country vs. country, this will prove to be more successful with audience than the IPL or BPL.

Tuk Tuk Master

Amer Siddiqui — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 19:22:31 +0000

With so many Misbah jokes flying around the web this week, we thought we’d share some of the best we have seen … so here’s a collection, all in one place:

The image size is slightly large, so you may have to wait for a few seconds as it loads …

End of Tour Review

Amer Siddiqui — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 10:03:57 +0000

Regardless of the outcome, the last five-six weeks has shown us some remarkable cricket in the form of Tests, ODI and T20s between Pakistan & England. This was the much awaited return tour after the sour tour of 2010 which was marked by the spot fixing controversy. England came with a big reputation whilst Pakistan entered the series as the underdogs but with a steady improvement graph shown over the past 18 months. The paras below will try and capture the highs and lows, the yes’s and the no’s of being a Pakistani cricket fan taking each form of the game in turn.

The 3 Match Test Series:

This was a remarkable test series. The much highly rated English team beaten 3-0 by a Pakistani side which clearly came as the underdogs. Prior to the test series I don’t think anyone would have predicted the results that we saw. In previous articles we have spoken at length about the test series but for the record this series was won by a combination of wonderful spin bowling by the spin twins Saeed Ajmal and Abdul Rehman. However at the same time both teams (Pakistan & England) need to dig deep into their batting which clearly was the failure of the tour. We saw 11 of the 15 days between the 3 test played in which we saw 110 wickets fall which is at an average of 10 wickets a day! 4 full days of cricket was not played which clearly showed the supremacy of the bowling but more importantly how fragile the batting of both sides was. Apart from 1st test match where Pakistan only lost 10 wickets each of the following test matches saw 40 wickets fall in each test at an alarmingly quick rate.

I don’t want to take the limelight and credit away from the wonderful job Saeed and Rehman did but there is a serious question mark on the batting ability between both teams. The highest score posted in an innings by Pakistan was in the 3rd test, 2nd innings where they put a total up of 365 thanks to Younis and Azhar Ali whilst the highest total put up by England was 327. Out of 6 innings England were able to cross 200 only once! This clearly shows that whilst both teams had issues around their batting, the battle was won in the bowling department where the Pakistani bowlers spearheaded by the spin twins was far greater than the English bowlers.

The ODI Series:

Now whilst initially I had expected Pakistan to be the underdogs in the tests, in the ODI’s I clearly thought Pakistan were favorites. After all, we were higher in the ranking than England and frankly for the past few years had been consistently doing well. However, we saw a repeat of the test series in terms of the results with a whitewash and 4-0 for England against Pakistan. In this series, clearly there were 2 differences between the teams.

The batting: Pakistan’s batting was shambolic. In all 4 games Pakistan were bowled out for scores of 130, 230, 222 & 237. This showed that the average our team were able to score was a poor 179 runs! None of the games were high scoring with 300 plus totals marked. The Pakistan batting was simply rubbish. We didn’t get partnerships going, the batsmen simply failed to adapt from the long form (tests) to ODI, they failed to do simple things like rotate the strike and I also personally had issues with the team selection.
The 2nd area which show a huge gap between the two teams was the quality of fielding. England were amazing, athletic and inspirational. I recall England saving 8 definite boundaries during one of the ODI’s which when you take 8 x 4 = 32 runs, this would be quite a contribution to the overall total.

Pakistan were boring and un-inspirational and it didn’t feel like the same team who had walked all over the English in the test series. I have read various excuses such as being home sick etc but frankly have the guts to admit we were pure and simple rubbish.

The Twenty20 Series:

We started off well by winning the 1^st T20 although frankly it was Umer Gul and our bowling which won this one for us. However generally once again, the batting was a flop and disappointment. We lost too many wickets too soon and apart from the final T20, we were unable to move at a steady pace. Our ability to adapt to the shortest form of the game was lacking and we didn’t have a plan. England play a lot of T20 domestically and one could see their strategy on approaching these games from the side line. The fielding was clinical, their bowling had a plan (Slow balls, in the rib cage, to the field) whilst our fielding and batting was poor. I have read a lot of Misbah ul Haq jokes over the past few days but seriously, when you cannot score 36 runs of 30 balls with 7 wickets remaining and the captain is at the crease then there is truly a fundamental issue.

Conclusion:

My conclusion is as follows. We have a very well balanced Test team but we need to find a solution to our mid order. We do not have the comfort of world class batsmen and a line of them which we enjoyed when the likes of Inzi, Yousuf, Misbah and Younis were in the batting order. We need to find that new talent and groom. Misbah is a good test captain and should continue although the transition planning should start on grooming the new captain. Who that is, I really don’t know and welcome views. With a stronger batting line there is no doubt we can become the number 1 test team in the next 18-24 months.

In ODI’s and T20’s we need to go back to the drawing board. We need to except that these forms or cricket require specialists. We should do what the Australians and English have done. Have specialist teams and captains for each format. I do not think Misbah should play T20’s and ODIs. Why is it the case that he brings us near at a snail’s pace but fails to complete the job (1^st T20 WC, 2011 WC Semi Final and Final T20 against England recently). I would make Hafeez both ODI and T20 captain. An intelligent cricketer with an all-round capability. At the same time pull raw talent out of our domestic league and work towards specialist teams for each format.

Finally, sort our bloody fielding out. Seriously, when watching from the stands one gets a much better perspective than on TV. There is a huge huge gap in the fielding quality Good fielding teams easily reduce the runs by 20-25. That is significant in both shorter formats …

All in all thought, I had a blast. I got to see many days of test cricket live, saw many wickets fall, saw amazing spin bowling, 2 whitewashes, a great ODI series and a healthy balance of both English and Pakistani supporters. I got to meet my friends from Birmingham, Mr. Pakistan & PakMan when I went to the games with my cousin Imran and revive the spirit of cricket in me once again that quite frankly had died after the spot fixing summer of 2010. Let’s remember the fonder memories, we beat England in the tests, ok, we had a bad ODI and T20 series but generally we saw wonderful cricket.

Bring on the next series! I cant wait.

T20 Series Preview & Live Discussion

AG — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 07:55:47 +0000

Talk about things unpredictable … first there is the T20 format itself, add to it the nature of Pakistan cricket team, which isn’t too far from it either and then add the way the last two series have gone between these two teams … and this becomes the mother of all unpredictables in cricket.

Anyone would be a fool trying to predict the side who can win the series here, let alone speculate on whether it will be a 2-1 win or a 3-0 whitewash. Usually when I find it too close to call, I go and check what odds the English bookies are offering to get some sense of which way they are inclining; after all, their bread and butter is based on predicting these. And since their extensive mathematical engines like to base their odds on statistics more than form, I was surprised to see they all are favouring England to win the first T20 as well as to take the series.

Why this surprised me? Well, okay, given the current form and what we have done in the ODIs recently aside but I thought we still were far superior statistically than them in this format … so I went and dug up some stats myself:

We, in my mind still boosted the best win/loss ratio in this format (1.72). Okay, turns out we have been surpassed by South Africa now (1.86) with their series win over New Zealand just this week. For comparisons, England languishes towards the bottom (1.16), just above Australia (1.14) and apart from Pakistan and South Africa, is behind Sri Lanka (1.53) and India (1.21) as well.

Next, they might be the current World T20 champions, but even in that tournament we have the best record. We have reached semi-final in all three editions, while no else has been able to get that far in more than one tournament, let alone all three. We have reached the Final twice, and have won it once as well.

Then I looked up the list of best bowlers. Most wicket takers: top three of the format are Afridi, Gul and Ajmal. England has two in the top-ten, Broad at no. 6 and Swann at no. 10. Best bowling figures also feature Gul twice in the top-ten with no English bowlers in sight. Extend it to top-twenty and Gul features twice more, Afridi twice and even Hafeez and Asif make the list, with Bopara being the sole English representative appearing once.

No surprises thus far, so I moved on to look at the batting records. Well, can’t really call it a surprise to find no Pakistanis towards the top in any of the records you look at, be it most runs in career, highest scores in an innings, most sixes, most fours, highest averages, and even highest strike rates. But then I couldn’t find many Englishmen either, except Pietersen sits second on most runs in career and fourth on most fours list.

Of course I was puzzled by the bookies favouring England as from the above four I can’t really call it advantage England. If anything, it should be advantage Pakistan. But then I filtered our head-to-head record against individual teams and what was staring me in the face was this: We have the worst win/loss ratio against England. (Okay, India and West Indies are the worst but then we have only played them twice and once respectively). Against England we have played seven T20s and have managed to win only two of them, with England triumphing in five … and they are the only team against whom we have never managed to score 150 ever.

Well, that last bit of information alone should have dampened your hopes but our worries remain greater than winning this one-off series alone … Amer has already discussed this in detail in the last post, England has cracked it and have three separate teams, three captains and are going to approach this with an eye to the World T20 later this year. For us, I don’t know (and I doubt very much) if our administrators even know that we have just six games scheduled between now and that World championship later in the year, thus making these three as 50% of our preparation. I’d love to see Hammad Azam and the new guy Awais Zia (already being called the New Boom Boom) in the side … but if I see Shoaib Malik or Imran Farhat in this playing XI, I’m boycotting and turning off my TV.

PS. Let’s just use this space below for discussion during the T20 series, instead of a separate post.

What went wrong?

Amer Siddiqui — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 11:13:16 +0000

So the hysteria of all Pakistan cricket fans (including me) was short lived. After the glorious performance by the boys in green during the test series, we were all on a high, the team was on a high, the management were on a high. However, what we didn’t realize is that secretly England were licking their wounds and plotting a comeback … and boy did they plot a comeback …

The current one day series against England is nothing but a huge embarrassment with the score line of 4-0 telling the story. Initially we all thought that it was going to be a walk in the park and a lot was said on this blog about Pakistan winning it 4-0 or 3-1. However not many of us expected the results to be what they are today … Lets try and focus and get to the root of the issue.

Firstly – England were wounded and down but not out. They have some quality players and they were bound to comeback. In the first 2 ODIs luck was on their side with them winning the toss and batting first. Abu Dhabi’s track record shows clearly that a team batting 2nd has always struggled to chase down the target. This is due to the fact that in the evening a lot of seam and swing is seen with the open surroundings and sea breeze coming across from the Yas Marina. Steve Finn was awesome, Pakistan were poor and twice the team was 5 wickets down without 100 on the board. England simply played very good cricket. Their fielding is brilliant, there bowling is very well balanced, Finn was outstanding and the batsmen did the job i.e. staying at the crease, rotating the strike, hitting the bad balls. There totals were nothing heroic and a target of 5 an over takes you back to the golden days of cricket when 250 was deemed a very good total. Indeed it was for Pakistan.

This followed the 2 ODIs in Dubai. Now my cousins (Usman & Imran) had specifically flown in from the UK for 48 hours to watch this game. What a huge disappointment it was for them. Pakistan won the toss and batted first but again their performance was hugely disappointing. I cannot recall the exact score but at one point we were no more than 75 runs on the board with 5 wickets down. Afridi and Akmal gave us some hope with a brilliant stand but it was unfortunate that they both got out back to back with 10 overs to spare. The final ODI saw a same story and England wrapped the series up 4-0.

Now onto findings and issues … So where did we go wrong? I list my views below:

1. Team Selection: See my point here is that if you look at the high performing teams globally then you have to include England, SA and Australia. You will notice that they all pretty much have a different line up, captain and structure for each one of these formats. The great teams have accepted the fact that in today’s day and age we have to look to specialists. England has 3 captains and pretty much a completely different line up for each one of their teams. Australia and SA follow a similar trend, albeit to a lesser extend. Pakistan continue to play with 70% of the same team that plays in the tests. In test cricket we have been brilliant lately but we score at no more than 2.5 runs per over. When you throw the same players into a T20 or ODI format they simply fail to adapt and get out at rash shots trying to increase the pace of the game. We need to accept that the 3 formats are very different and apart from a select few, we need to groom specialists.

2. Recruiting Youth: Ricky Ponting can probably walk into any international ODI or T20 team except Australia. We should take a lesson out of this and recruit some new blood into our T20 and ODI teams. The likes of Misbah, Younis should do what Ricky has done and focus on Test cricket going forward. Allow Pakistan to groom some new blood and give them a chance. I have heard so much about Hammad but we have not had a chance to see his skill set due to being stuck in the stone ages and playing a test/ODI cum T20 team.

3. Combination: I don’t think our team selection combo has worked well. Playing one seamer and 5 spinners on the basis of what? A decent test series! I think this is taking the selection to an extreme. In ODI and T20’s you need a balanced team in all departments. Even in the great days of when we had the pace attack of Wasim, Waqar and Aqib we used to play 2 spinners so that it was a well balanced team in all areas. Pakistan needs to go back to the drawing board on the team combo and ensure we have covered ourselves in each area.

4. Fielding: Although things have improved significantly since Ijaz Ahmad has been incharge, did you guys see the quality of the English fielding. I counted 7 boundaries being saved from diving efforts when at the 3rd ODI. Now 7×4 = 28 so all of a sudden it does enhance the score … Our fielding remains questionable and needs to improve with the modern game.

The above are just a few observations and I can write forever but given I am at work, am opening it up to the floor. Where do you guys/girls think we went wrong and what do you predict for the T20s? With Pietersen now on fire and clearly the danger man, unless we do something drastic, Afridi finds form and we get our bowling combos right, I don’t have a good feeling about the T20s!

Breaking News: Whatmore is the new man!

AG — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 08:02:22 +0000

Australian Dav Whatmore will replace the Pakistan team’s interim coach Mohsin Khan after the current series against England ends this month. Whatmore would take charge as head coach from the Asia Cup tournament in Bangladesh next month.

“It has been decided to release Mohsin from his coaching assignment after the England series and Whatmore has been chosen as the man to guide our team over the next two years”, our source inside the PCB has said.

Whatmore is 57 years old and has coached the great Sri Lankan side who won the 1996 World Cup. He coached Bangladesh from 2003 to 2007 as well, leading them to their first test victory in early 2005 against Zimbabwe and also guided them into the super eight stage of the 2007 World Cup where they defeated India and South Africa.

The Board has also decided to hire the English professional coach Julien Fountain as the fielding coach of the national team.

More to follow … as PCB will announce this later on today (and then at some point Cricinfo and the rest of the news media will perhaps pick on it too :)

Live Discussion: Pak v Eng – ODI 3 & 4

Amer Siddiqui — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 07:00:43 +0000

Here’s the space to get the discussions going for the last two ODIs …

If you have missed our ODI series preview, you can read it right here, and comments from the first two ODIs can be found here.

Live Discussion: Pak v Eng – ODI 1 & 2

AG — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 10:00:47 +0000

Here’s the space to get the discussions going for the first two ODIs …

If you have missed our ODI series preview, you can read it right here.

Unreserved Annoyance

AG — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 18:26:28 +0000

I am totally, utterly and absolutely annoyed … this time however, it has nothing to do with Team Pakistan. It’s the two boards (ECB and PCB) who put together and agreed the scheduling for this series.

While I will be congratulating them both (when I preview the T20 series) for recognizing the need for a full series of T20s instead of the 1 or 2 offs that has been the part of any bilateral series in international cricket lately, I can’t condemn them enough for this joke they have done with the fans by scheduling 4 one-day games.

What the hell is wrong with these administrators everywhere? Do they not live in the same world as us? Do they not see the same game and follow it the same way as we do? Initially, they had announced a 5 ODI series alongside 3 Tests and 3 T20s … and I was of course very happy to be getting the full series that both teams (and their fans) deserve, and more so that this time the T20s will get a final decider instead of the 2 that have become the norm in recent times … but then someone somewhere chopped 1 ODI game in favour of two tour games to be played on the day the first ODI was originally scheduled (today). For the record, I’d have been happier with 3 ODIs if they couldn’t get 5 in, but 4 is simply ridiculous.

I am all for bringing Associates’ and Affiliates’ standards up by giving them opportunities to play top-tier teams but not at the cost of this … As I write, Pakistan is playing Afghanistan in Sharjah as preparation for the upcoming ODI series, while over in Abu Dhabi England XI beat the crap out of their own B Team (England Lions) earlier today … all in the name of preparation. I am not sure if Cricinfo’s headline for the report on that earlier game, that English batsmen have found form, is sarcasm or some form of idiocy? Because England Lions batting first got out for a mere 96; then the two captains and English coaches decided that the senior side needed a more thorough workout before facing Pakistan, so a fictitious target of 230 was agreed on, which too England passed easily with 25 balls to spare … all of this that deprived the fans of one important ODI game.

Why am I so disgusted by all of this? Well, how would you like this result at the end of the series … Pakistan won the Test series 3-0, won the T20 series … and ODI series drawn 2-2 (well, they could have won that too but there was no fifth ODI to play for). Not just Pakistani fans but turn the situation around, English fans would be as upset. They have an opportunity here after losing the Test series to come back and win the ODI series, but oh wait, to win a 4 game series, you have to win 3 games. So let me come straight to the ODI series preview, which is what I should have been writing about … here’s my series prediction: 2-2 … and it’s going to leave both sides of fans extremely disappointed after such a great Test series and wishing for that 1 more ODI. Do I need to remind anyone of the South Africa – Australia 2 Test series last year?

Now of course I am secretly wishing that Pakistan can perhaps win 3 or all 4 ODIs (but then English fans would be hoping for the same for their team). 4 is the no. of ODIs we’ll get this series, so that means the team wanting to win the series must win 3 games (as if playing a 5 game series) but can afford to lose just 1 (as if playing a 3 game series). On the other hand, the team wanting to get-out-of-jail will just have to win 2 to draw the series (the no. that won’t be enough in a 5 game series) … enough of me vetting my anger at administrators, let’s talk cricket:

If England thought they had seen enough of Pakistan’s spin, wait till Afridi and Malik enter the fray. Now Malik might be out of form a bit and his threat level not as high as our other spinners, but Afridi is in a league of his own. He just took another five-for a few hours ago against Afghanistan, which also saw him become the 8^th highest wicket taker in the ODIs, and second in the spinners list as he leap-frogged Anil Kumble. In this form of the game, Afridi is the spearhead of our spin attack and come Monday, Englishmen will actually wish they were facing Ajmal or Rehman instead.

Apart from Boom Boom, and the obvious confidence and high carried over from the Test series, there are a few other things going for Pakistan as we enter the ODI phase of the tour. Now England might be the no. 1 ranked Test team or the current World T20 champions, but when it comes to the 50 over format, we are actually better ranked than them (5 and 6 respectively). We also went further than them in the ICC World Cup, which was the most recent ODI event involving all top teams … and their recent whipping at the hands of India in their last ODI series in sub-continental conditions does put us ahead of them on paper as clear favourites.

But we all know too well that being favourites on paper is one thing and actually producing results on the field is another … just ask England ;) With them hurting and us a little over-confident and perhaps still basking in the glory of recent success, they might just catch us off-guard. So Team Pakistan should really guard against complacency and that’s the only thing they need to worry about right now.

Well, that and Imran Farhat. While I am bashing administrators, I might as well take a swipe at this issue. I don’t see him producing a 50 (or for that matter even a 30) in this series … like he did against Bangladesh or today against Afghanistan, and that should hopefully be enough to see the end of him. Although, when he married the daughter of one of our selectors (now chief-selector in Mohsin’s absence from the committee); even he couldn’t have imagined that he’d be supported this far.

Apart from that opening spot, I don’t see any weak links in our side. To field a playing XI will in fact be a tough task given the resources at hand. Rehman despite his brilliant form and Englishmen’s inability to play him might have to make way for someone else. Umer Akmal’s only way in this batting line-up will be by replacing his brother and keeping wickets. Wahab, given his hitting ability is likely to feature as support for Gul in the pace department but we might very well at some point decide to line up 4 spinners. Actually hypothetically, we can even make 5 spinners bowl out the full 50 overs. How? Quite simple actually … Hafeez and Rehman can bowl with the new ball very well, Afridi can spin them in the middle overs with support from Malik perhaps, and Ajmal at the death. If English batsmen aren’t having nightmares yet, pls. read this blog and this particular scenario is bound to give them a headache. However, this might not happen in real unless we lose Gul to some injury or something else as his reverse swing and pretty damn accurate yorkers are in a class of its own.

Finally another thing going in Pakistan’s favour is the fact that they have already played under the new ODI rules; starting with two new balls, the change in when powerplays can or must be taken and the 1 review per innings under UDRS. Although, to really benefit from these rule changes one needs to put on a ‘strategic’ hat, which I am not too sure if Misbah or our team management has mastered yet but still that’s one new thing that England will have on their minds.

As I come to close … Pakistan has just finished their practise by thrashing Afghanistan by 7 wickets (with 77 balls to spare). Here’s hoping we get to see four more such whippings over the next eleven days …

PS. I am scheduling a live discussion post (space for discussion), which will come on-line about an hour from the start of the first ODI on Monday (just like we did for the Test matches) but this time instead of each ODI, we will just have one post for the full series.