COMMENT – Having seen Shahid Afridi bowl them to victory in their first three matches it seemed to me that there may just have been a suggestion of a similarity between this team and the side that won the World Cup in 1992, in that they had drawn strength from the adversity they found themselves in. With Imran Khan’s side it was just that they endured a terrible start to the tournament. Afridi’s team, it hardly need to be said, have been through far worse things in the last six months. And yet here they were winning all their matches, with all the old enmities apparently put to one side.
Younus Khan, whose captaincy was so divisive that it led eight players to take an oath of allegiance not to play under him, is back from exile. As is Misbah-ul-Haq, who threatened to quit last July because he was fed up with being ignored by the selectors. And then there was Shoaib Akhtar, still one of the most entertaining men in the game, even if he is a little thicker around and the middle and thinner on top than he once was. In my head I saw a line about their being a little of the spirit of Imran’s cornered tigers about the team. Turned out that caged pandas would have been closer to it.
Or in Kamran’s case, a performing seal, clapping his hands at the ball as though he expected Afridi to toss him a fish if he happened to cling on to it. Cruel as it may be to say, his incompetence behind the stumps is staggering. In four games in this World Cup so far he has dropped two catches, refused to try for a third and squandered two stumpings. The wicketkeeper is the heart of any cricket team in the field, and Pakistan need a transplant. When Ross Taylor edged his third ball between ‘keeper and slip, Kamran looked imploringly at the man stood alongside him, Younus, who simply turned his back and stared in the other direction. So much for team spirit.
When Shoaib bunged four overthrows over Akmal’s head after fielding a forward defensive off his own bowling, he stood with one hand on his hip. “Waqar!” shouted one member of the press, “can you tell me, what is the difference between Kamran and Michael Jackson?” Waqar chuckled, “The difference is that Michael Jackson is dead,” he said. Sadly, in all the ensuing laughter I didn’t catch the proper punchline, but any suggestions as to what it could have been would be welcome. (Courtesy The Guardian)
