Cricket

I once wrote that Shahid Afridi is possibly the only cricketer in history who is dangerous for both sides in the same match. He is potentially the finest leader along with Younis Khan that we have ready at present (Salman Butt remains the longer term hope). He has also developed into arguably the finest spinner, if not the finest bowler, in one-day cricket. Even his batting has started to utilise brain in addition to brawn. Why, then, does Afridi...

I wrote in my previous blog that reality will surface once the dust settles on the IPL auction 2010. Well it has, and it seems the Pakistani government, PCB, and the cricketers themselves had a knee-jerk response to the IPL fiasco. Now the real comedy will begin as our cricketers try to wriggle out of what the ministers have got them into. First came the misplaced call for unity, now comes the every-man-for-himself clamour. It took two cunningly placed...

“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.” says Clark Gable in Gone with the wind. It’s been voted the No. 1 movie quote of all time by AFI and works for me when I see that no Pakistani has been picked by the IPL franchise owners now marketing completely to the anti-Pakistan market. It’s much better than Portia’s grumble: “You taught me first to beg, and now methinks you teach me how a beggar should be answered.” By now you must have...

For a cricket board that is crying hoarse that it is being bled to death financially, it is quite strange that they have gone for a 17-man team (if you don’t include Imran Nazir going specifically for a three-hour event at the end) to play five ODIs. He should go down as a bigger specialist in his field than the best heart surgeon out there is in his. We have lined up 17 players for one Twenty20 match coming five days after the end of the ODI series,...

The lead up for the third Test has been something like the closing moments of ‘The Departed’ where you just don’t know who will be shooting whom next. But more pertinently, it’s been the story of the Akmals in the shape of Munna Bhai and Circuit. Lage raho, Munna Bhai. Sadly, the story that bhai log had made a breakthrough on the tour has been doing a round of the blogs. I doubt that. Not even Nostradamus could predict that three catches would...

The Test series between Australia and Pakistan is over, and it was won by Younis Khan. Don’t believe me? Well, think about this: after the hugely impressive Umar Akmal and Mohammad Aamer, no one’s stature has made greater strides in the last two weeks. For a guy who was busy failing in two matches for Habib Bank, that’s a pretty impressive feat. Consider these facts: 1. After the heavy defeat in Melbourne, our board and selectors were requested...

Four dropped catches, including three off the same batsman who went on to score a match-stealing century. Add to that a single-minded determination to destroy the career of the country’s best spin bowler, and you’re forced to confront the fact that our wicketkeeper is more dangerous to our team than the opposition itself. There can be no questioning that Kamran Akmal is the sole reason we lost a match which was unequivocally ours for the taking. But...

Every time I promise myself not to expect anything from you and try to keep myself from following you, you spring a surprise and my heart flutters with hope. Only to come crashing down again…and every fall is worse than the last. One brilliant innings from Fawad Alam, a couple of jaw-dropping, sparkling innings from Umar Akmal or a raw-energy filled spell of immaculate fast bowling from Mohammad Aamer is all it takes for expectations to rise...

One hundred and seventy runs was the margin of Pakistan’s defeat in the first test against Australia, and strangely, the cold numbers felt both unkind and generous to the gulf between the sides. On the one hand, Australia declared twice, and we can only imagine what the actual margin would have been if they had finished even one of their innings. On the other, Pakistan actually fought the third day to a draw and outright won the fourth day, suggesting...

I’m sure you’re all familiar with the law of averages. Quite some time back a very optimistic Swiss mathematician named Jacob Bernoulli postulated that there existed a more or less predictable ratio between the number of random trials of an event and its occurrences. Nobody really cared what old Bernoulli said at the time and it was up to his cult fan base to re-package his theory for commercial consumption by adding a bit of pizzazz to it. Thus,...