HOW TO SET THE FIELD FOR LEGGIES (IN ASIA)

 

It's funny which pieces get the most attention, the most traction on social media. Usually, they are ones involving Asian themes, and in this regard the ESPNcricinfo subeditor that chose the headline of this one did well. (I didn't dare venture below the line. Indian commenters are a special breed...)

The piece was published in advance of England's tour of the UAE, when it seemed likely that Adil Rashid would get a gig. He did, of course, starting with a five-for in a Test that England almost swindled after it had ambled along for four days, but fading quickly as both he and Moeen failed to exert any kind of control on the Pakistani batsman. Still, he has gone on to have an exceptional Big Bash League, and looks a crucial prospect for our T20

Around the same time, South Africa were arriving in India for their own Test series with an old friend Imran Tahir having been picked for what was likely to be his last flirt with the five-day game (he remains a first-choice pick for SA's white-ball teams).
 
This piece recapitulates an idea that I developed while watching Immy's torrid early experiences in Test cricket, trying to figure out a way for him to be more effective. 

How to Manage Legspinners in Asia 

 

YOU MUST BE BHATTI

My latest blog for ESPNcricinfo's Cordon was prompted by what would have been, given different genetics, the hair-raising experience of playing against recent Pakistani fast bowler Bilawal Bhatti. (And if it was hair-raising for me, with reasonable experience of playing against quick bowlers, what would it have been like for the clutch of under-15s in the side?)

The editor in India gave it the somewhat workaday and slightly misleading heading: Do Professionals Raise the Standard of Club Cricket?, failing to indicate that I was talking solely about the lower echelons of the recreational game. Still, it has been fairly well received. The following week a member of our opposition, Bagnall, poked his head round our dressing room door before the game to tell me he'd enjoyed it (thereby precluding himself from being sledged by yours truly), as did a couple of his colleagues after the game.

The comments below the line – often a hotbed of rancour from the growing legions of bedroom-dwelling firebrands known as "keyboard warriors" – were generally supportive, although there was one bright spark – going by the name Ali Shah, not especially rare in certain parts of the world, though hopefully not the Ali Shah who plays in my team – who spent several seconds of his life typing out the following: "Mmm ... two points of note in this piece: first, what exactly has 9/11 got to do with cricket? Secondly is the author using Bilawal Bhatti to inflate his ego because he got a fifty in that game? A sad non-article."

Given that I failed to mention my score in the game, I can only commend Ali Shah on his sleuthing. Bravo. 

 

SHAHID IN THE SHIRES

Almost twenty-six thousand social media shares – 26,000! For a yarn about North Staffordshire league cricket!

Alright, it was about Shahid Afridi's half-season playing for Leek (and Little Stoke), but still, that's a lot of people to be introduced to Richard Harvey, David Edwards, 'Tracker' Johnson and others that helped put the story together.

It's a shame I couldn't include comments from Dave Fairbanks, Brian Mellor, Pete Wilshaw and a few others, or that more stories emerged (from Rob Haydon and Adrian Butters) after publication.

Nevertheless, it was an enjoyable piece to write (finally), and, judging by the reaction – and yes, I'm aware that Afridi is probably second only to Sachin in the list of most venerated cricketers these last couple of decades – an enjoyable one to read.

Oh, and if you want to see the skit from Bo Selecta! that I imitated when greeting Afridi to the crease (and the editors at cricinfo thought it best to exclude), here it is.

Staffordshire's Summer of Afridi

 

SAQLAIN MUSHTAQ: GLEANINGS

Another Gleanings interview, this time with the founder of the doosra: Saqi bhai.

Parts of our conversation that didn't make it included a few thoughts on his brief time sub-pro'ing for Burslem in the NSSCL, and his comments on Imran Tahir (which were positive).

We didn't speak about the time a certain former housemate of mine and one-time colleague at Wollaton CC lofted him for a straight six to bring up his maiden Premier League hundred. He wouldn't be drawn on whom, out of him, Usman Afzaal and Alex Tudor, wasn't being paid the year he played for West Indian Cavaliers (league rules limiting the number of paid players to two).

And he claimed not to know anything about the nightclub that Saeed Anwar – the man responsible for the increasing religious devotion in the Pakistani squad during the 1990s – used to have in the basement of his Lahore residence, before the tragic death of his three-year-old daughter led him to seek solace in Islam. 

Still, he told me a couple of funny yarns about his cricketing days, and one heartbreaking story of a talented quick bowler who injury got the better of. 

Saqlain Mushtaq: Gleanings

IS MOHAMMAD AMIR'S BAN A BLESSING IN DISGUISE?

Mohammad Amir: pariah or victim of circumstance? Scourge of the game who ought to have been banished ad infinitum, or a gullible and naive tool of his captain and his agent's malign schemes?

Clearly, both arguments are tenable, but this piece for ESPNcricinfo's The Cordon tries to look beyond the moral issues – which, heaven knows, has been done to death – and examine the seeming inevitability of his cricketing resurrection, specifically whether the five-year absence from the game might actually have helped him.

Amir's ban a blessing in disguise 

 

QUICK SINGLES: ABDUL RAZZAQ

One thing I've learned since trying to write about cricket for cash is always to be on the lookout for an earner. So, when I pootled along to watch Moddershall play Hem Heath in the Staffs Cup quarter-finals, I thought I might as well ask their overseas player, Abdul Razzaq (46 Tests, 265 ODIs, 32 T20Is), for an interview. He was obliging ... up to a point. He studiously rebuffed any frivolous questions I had, instead seeming upon taking every opportunity to get stuck in to the Pakistan Cricket Board - not all of which made the final piece for ESPNcricinfo. He wasn't chuffed with them, old Abdur Prozac.

I also learned that, when he played for Middlesex, the team used to watch porn films in the dressing room to help the players relax. Interesting theory. Not sure walking out to bat with the desire to crack one off is all that relaxing, myself...

Quick Singles: Abdul Razzaq 

A BROTH OF KHANS

Sadly, it appears that the Pakistan Cricket Board are set on dispensing with the certificate-lacking coaching and man-managerial talents of dear, avuncular Mohsin Khan, a man who, with the phlegmatic support of Misbah-ul-Haq, has restored a sheen of sanity, order and hope to one of the game’s great cricketing cultures as it emerged from perhaps its darkest hour. Given that success, the only sensible thing to do was bring in Dav Whatmore tout de suite. It is therefore a fitting moment to select an All-Time XI of Khans (to play an imaginary game against The Smiths, maybe...no, not that Smiths) to celebrate Mohsin’s all-too-brief tenure. 

Unfortunately, a few of the more obvious names failed to make the cut. Firstly, Imran Khan, widely regarded as the greatest Pakistani cricketer of them all and certainly its leader nonpareil, fails to get in. Ask Ijaz Butt, our Chairman of Selectors, why that might be. 

Zaheer Khan also doesn’t make it. As gladdened as the heart is that the religious homogeneity of the sport’s team of a pious nation is rendered impure (as indeed was Pakistan’s, with the pre-conversion Christian, Yousuf Yohanna, and the Hindu, Danish Kaneria, who possibly venerated the goddess Vishnu, judging by the number of pies in which he had fingers), there is no place for Zed.

Talking of Danish, Jutland’s second greatest seamer (after the mighty ‘Blood-Axe’, Ole Mortensen), sometime England new-ball sprayer Amjad, also fails to make the grade. As do Moin, Younus, Majid and Bazid, Junaid, Sohail, and the quickly discarded, now forgotten Zakir, Arshad, Kabir, Azam, Rashid, Azhar, and Anwar. And there’s no place either for Imraan Khan, from the country of the aardvark and aardwolf. None of these Khans make it.

In the end, we went for an eclectic mix of talents. You be the judge.   

(1) Jahangir Khan

When it comes to Pakistan and rackets, it’s often forgotten that the country has a strong tradition in both badminton and squash. Jahangir, whose name derives from the Persian for ‘Conqueror of the World (with Backhand)’, was unbeaten for five years, a streak of dominance not seen before or since. Such endurance and focus are perfect attributes for an opener.  

(2) Amir Khan

Cousin of the wild and whippy Fabio Coentrão lookalike, Saj Mahmood, the pugnacious Amir’s speed on his feet and ability to duck and dive make him the ideal opening partner for JK.

(3) Simon Khan

I was once told that cricketers should never play golf on account of the different swings of the tool (pipe down, Carry On fans) sending confusing messages to the hands. Alas, I turned out a mediocre batsman. If my pitch ’n’ put is any indication, I could have been a genius golfer. Life’s Garden of Forking Paths: decisions made, futures never lived…

(4) Shere Khan

When Imran Khan gave his famous, nation-inspiring “fight like cornered tigers” speech midway through the 1992 World Cup, prompting a streak of victories that took them from the brink of ignominious exit to an evisceration of a decent England side in the final at the MCG, he probably had this deviously villainous big cat in mind. Anyway, since Kipling’s creatures can obviously meet the twin imposters, Triumph and Disaster, just the same, he’s ideal to bat at four, just as well equipped to deal with 2 for 2 as 200 for 2

(5) Chaka Khan

When Chaka Khan burst into the national conscious – sorry, let me re-phrase that (I’ve just been trying to pitch ghastly, insincere, and largely pointless cultural zeitgeist pieces and have thus been writing overblown sentences about fluff for buzzvibezzz magazine): When Chaka Khan (…Let me rock ya / Let me rock ya, Chaka Khan / Let me rock ya / that’s all I wanna do) had a couple of pop-hits on that radio in the 1980s, tunes that would have drilled their way into the cranial lobes of anyone sat in a van or a factory aurally forcefed the depressing soundtrack of Radio 1, she sounded to my imagination like an elfin, svelte goddess. Not so. Despite, ahem, large lungs lending the stock quality of the stock bowler, she’s probably more suited to giving it some Humpty in the middle order – although she’s also pretty adaptable, too [make up gag based on ‘I’m Every Woman’], just in case Shere Khan nicks off and the ship needs steadying.

(6) Genghis Khan [c]

Despite the regal bearing and unifying charisma of Imran Khan, the obvious choice for captain is Temujin, aka Genghis Khan, himself unifier of the Mongol tribes, pre-requisite of his imperial drive. Gengho is chosen not only for the outstanding ability to array elements in an open space (the very touchstone of cricket tactics, of course, and a trait common to all nomads of the steppe), but also his pitiless stance on indiscipline. Since the speed and range he showed in conquest lend themselves to bowling and middle-order hitting respectively, he is clearly an all-rounder of rare gifts, so slots in at six. Or wherever the fuck he fancies, to be honest.

(7) Oliver Kahn [wk]

With his Planet of the Apes chic, and displaying all the restraint under pressure and humility that one expects from German goalkeepers (cf. Lehmann, Jens), Kahn is a natural ‘keeper, an ideal gloveman. Could probably jibber-jabber and schieß-sprache at the batsman all day, too.

(8) Kublai Khan

Gets in on account of (a) funding the ground and pavilion out in Xanadu, and (b) being the grandson of the captain. Bowls decent leggies, too – albeit perhaps not as good as ol’ Gengho reckons.

(9) Shahrukh Khan

Bollywood actor. Owner of Kolkata Knight Riders. From what I can glean, is very, very good at having his picture taken and waving at the camera. Just about manages to suppress the ‘I cannot believe my fucking luck’ smile from his visage, too, so gets in as master of spin: off breaks, to be precise.  

(10) Khan Noonien Singh

Genetically engineered superhuman tyrant familiar to Trekkies the world over. The Christian symbolism of Star Trek is well known (Captain Kirk), so that would make Khan a devil figure, cast out and seeking vengeance – essentially the mentality one is after in a new ball bowler.

(11) James Caan [vc]

Not the supremely capable of plastering a charming smile on his face to hide his moneylust entrepreneur from Dragon’s Den who helps the country of his birth (where he was given a name, Nazim Khan, that he felt was perhaps just a bit too Urdu for business) by offering to buy babies from folk stricken by the floods, but the star of Stephen King adaptation Misery, Rollerball, and The Godfather, where he memorably portrayed the volatile and violent Sonny Corleone. This hot-headedness and familiarity with the psychology of highly dangerous hard-ball games make him primo new conker material. 

And there you have it. Thoughts, etc?

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NINE-AND-A-HALF HALF-ARSED HALF-FORMED HALF-TRUTHS ON ENGLAND'S 1ST TEST LOSS TO PAKISTAN

Rocking the Misbah at The Jazz Club

"LOOK..."

Ever since the twin influences of Sports Psychology and media training – not to mention the psychology of media performances – reached a tipping point at some point in the middle of the last decade, after which time cricketers’ clumsy, clunky and pernicious butchering of the language has been near-omnipresent (save an off-the-cuff Swann or two), it has been pretty much mandatory for these automata cricketers to begin their largely banal answers to equally banal questions with a subtly aggressive “Look …” I believe it originates from Ricky Ponting, his way of conveying contempt for implicitly idiotic questions as well as getting his questioner back on the right track. Now it appears that even the cool-as Waqar Younis is doing it, judging by his interview on the Dubai square with the ever-earnest Nasser about the precise way to go about bowling on roads (“When do you go full, though? I mean, you can’t just float it up there and get driven.” “Look…”). So, look, I say it’s about time we all did it. Look, it’s all about CONCEALING YOUR WEAKNESSES FROM THE OPPOSITION, WHO WANT TO END YOUR CAREER AND EAT YOUR HEART ON TOAST. Look, BE FUCKING STRONG, OK? Say “Look”. Look, now!

LOOK, ENGLAND COULDN'T BAT THEIR EYELIDS

Poor batting generally results from cluttered minds and/or poor concentration. England’s first innings batting smacked of a machista attempt to assert themselves against spin before they’d truly figured out which were good options and which were not so good. The crucial thing is that, because the ball wasn’t spitting at them and the wicket threat wasn’t high, they had time to get properly in before quietly making these calls to themselves, putting ticks and crosses against the various shots: sweep, cut, use feet, extra-cover drive. Strauss’s awful pull in the first innings set the tone for the panicky sweeps that followed (tip: don’t sweep on shiny, barely turning decks when guys are bowling wicket-to-wicket). And KP’s moronic hook in the second innings confirmed the temporarily endemic brainmelt. Wipe the humble pie from tha lips, boys, and get back to basics.

Postcards from the County Championship

LOOK, THE VENUE (AND SCHEDULING) IS AN ELITIST FOLLY

Played out in a near-empty state-of-the-art 25,000-capacity bowl, the Dubai match looked just like County Championship cricket played at Test venues: 1000 or so lost diehards forming a fleshy tableau behind de rigueur St George’s flags onto which were stitched the names of clubs from Slipless in Settle. Aside from the amount of clothes they were wearing, the main difference between this Test and, say, Yorkshire versus Glamorgan at Headingley was the cash flow of the punters: State pensions and homemade butties versus income ‘disposable’ enough to allow one to gallivant to the cricket-playing part of the planet’s must-visit destinations, including artificial and a-cultural communities grown in the Petri dish of the desert (Australia, for instance) yet without the mitigating allure of vice. Anyway, the sight of a stadium speckled with ICC nabobs and a few not-so-Barmy Army – those in Dubai can perhaps be considered a sort of TA, compared to the hardcore Marines that got pissed every day for a month Down Under – reminded us of the pressures that Test cricket is facing (which, incidentally, is the subject of an intriguing new film project by Cricinfo’s camera-wielding pranksters, Jarrod and Sampson [aka The Two Chucks]).

LOOK, BUMBLE IS THE MAN

When not doing chicken impressions, the Accrington anecdotemonger was inspired by the ubiquitous livery of sponsors, Jazz (a mobile phone company, apparently), to mimic the hushed, syrupy tones of The Fast Show’s John Thompson’s Jazz Club. Broadcasting highlight of the year so far, although the competition hasn’t been very strong…

"Sorry, what did you say your name was?"

LOOK, AAMIR SOHAIL IS PRICK(LY)

Mr Sohail brought a very aggressive and chippy new presence to the box, I feel. On Day 1, I had the distinct impression that Mike Atherton – not someone you would imagine shirking a rumble – had to bite his tongue (I cannot recall over what) in order to sidestep an on-air brouhaha, which he did dextrously and professionally. Then, on Day 3, when Bumble mildly criticized Adnan Akmal for bringing a hint of village cricket to the international arena by trying the old 20-yard stumping, underarming the ball at the stumps every so often (which clearly annoyed Trott and Prior and caused embarrassed laughter among the elder statesmen of his team), Sohail rasped: “Yaa, but Matt Prior would do same”. Alright, kid; settle down! Bumble went silent for well over a minute. Friction in the box, methinks (not that sort!). On which note, I wonder how Sohail’s getting on with his former opening partner, the altogether more placid and charming Rameez Raja… Anyway, I’ll be keeping an eye on this: paranoid and defensive in the extreme. (Incidentally, A Sohail is not a million miles from “asshole”, and probably quite easy to mispronounce as such.)

[Look, this “Look” shit has got to stop immediately – Ed.]

 Willis

"WHAT CHU TALKIN' 'BOUT, WILLIS?"

Sat in the charisma-free zone of the Sky Studio with Gower, Professor Yaffle was at his curmudgeonly, droning, joyless worst, a veritable creaking door hinge of a man. Although I tend to switch off – metaphorically, I mean – when he speaks, this time I listened as he tossed out the accusation that Saeed Ajmal only wore long-sleeved shirts to hide a bent elbow. Tiresome. I’m not entirely sure whether Atherton’s post-match interview with Man of the Match Ajmal – who’d come into the game trumpeting a new delivery, the teesra – contained a Freudian slip when he asked “have you got anything else up your sleeve?” but anyway, with Sky Sports happy to have their viewers subject to Willisian misery as a counterbalance to Bumble’s joie de vivre, evidently (especially in the post-T20 world of Dilscoops and switch hits) it truly does take Different Strokes.

TRESCOBABBLE

Stick to being head-and-shoulders above your contemporaries at cuffing half-decent county seamers about the place, Marcus, because your punditry is woeful: lacking insight, falling back on dog-eared half-truths (“it’s about the mental battle now,” apparently; wasn’t it ever thus for Banger...), and occasionally bordering on actual nonsense. There’s a certain category of pundit – ex-players, I mean (not that Tres is retired) – who presumably struggle to articulate their ideas because throughout their active life in the dressing room they would unfailingly litter their language with profanities. No observation would be proffered without a “fucking” as modifier or intensifier. Of course, given things like broadcasting standards, watersheds and whatnot, the new environment thus tends to bring about a certain awkward self-consciousness in our pundit (think Tommo on Sky Soccer Saturday), leaving him inhibited and tongue-tied, shorn of his stock diction. Now, I’m not 100% sure this is the case with Tresco, but listening to his contorted attempts to bring some expertise to bear on proceedings, I’m starting to see why Somerset have fallen short so often recently. Waffle.

 Bad Mo Fo

TEST MATCH SOFA

I haven’t tuned in to The Sofa so far, mainly because I cannot synch commentary to images, but I’d be colossally disappointed if they didn’t have, as the jingle for Pakistani skipper Misbah-ul-Haq, The Clash’s ‘Rocking the Casbah’: Shareef don't like it... I would also hope they have a slice of Tchaikovsky for the luxuriantly coiffeused Mohammad Hafeez – funnily enough, a cricketer whose name is exactly what a Turkish guy in an Istanbul nightclub once said to me when I was on the lookout for disco biscuits – on account of his balletic variation on the Saqlain template: a dinky shuffle or glide to the wicket then, in the gather, arms above head in the “fifth position”. I expect to see him in a leotard for the next game.

TREMLETT'S HEIGHT DISADVANTAGE

Ask any of what Jamie Redknapp might call the game’s “top, top” top-order batters what they least like to face, chances are they’ll say “bounce” rather than pace. (Before you write in and complain, or send me death threats for being “totelee fukin rong”, there’s a good chance the top top top-order batter might use a synonym: trajectory, say, or height – use your fucking imagination.) Bowlers who crash the ball into the splice from pretty much a good length are to be feared for precisely the same reason as an old sash window is: it’s easy to get your digits trapped by them. Which hurts. On the benign surface of Dubai, however, the bounce has hardly been steepling, even though, when the ball was hard, it still cleared the bails from a good length for the likes of Tremlett. Consequently, with lbw and bowled being the most likely mode of dismissal, Tremors [which must be the correct orthography, fellow writers and bloggers, not 'Tremmers'] has had to pitch the ball further up, duly bringing it into the batter’s driving zone, the overall result of which being that he went wicketless for the first completed innings of his career. So, 1-0 down with two to play: do we need a change? ...Well, it’s certainly a shame that Bresnan has had elbow problems (not connected to chucking, said the unsuspicious Willis of the salt-of-the-earth Englishman) as he’d be very useful out here, bowling straight and reversing it, not to mention chipping in with runs. As it is, the media will speculate about the rapidly improving and decidedly brisk Steve Finn being chucked in, maybe even Monty, but in the end Flower and Strauss will stick with the same side. Fickle, they are not.

Shaven ravers...

BEARDLESS WONDERS

I note that none of the current Pakistan side are sporting beards: a veritable Beard Free Zone. Does this mean a lessening of the religious zeal that embraced the team at various points under various recent leaderships, with group prayers and suchlike? At the risk of bringing a fatwa upon myself for venturing a hypothesis of such infinitesimal insignificance it might as well be suppressed, there might be an inverse correlation between the degree and intensity of a team’s piety and their capacity to muck in together and accept responsibility: i.e. the more devout, the more submissive, the less likely to be properly accountable, the more likely to look to blame others and fall apart. To be clear, I would contend that this is true of any faith. The fact is that the secular ethos, which holds that we are the architects of our own destiny in the universe, that we must build our own histories, our own institutions, often means taking active responsibility, which tends to help in cricket, with its individual-battles-within-team-context format… Anyway, I’m no pogonophobe, but is there not something in this beardlessness and their improved performance? At the very least, all that hair around the chin in a hot climate cannot help people find a space of comfort in which to perform...

And that’s it. Bring on Abu Dhabi and the excruciating Fred Flintstone gags…

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