So here is the latest squad annouced for the test series against SRI.
Probables: Younis Khan, Salman Butt, Nasir Jamshed, Khurram Manzoor, Shoaib Malik, Misbah-ul-Haq, Faisal Iqbal, Asim Kamal, Fawad Alam, Bazid Khan, Saeed Bin Nasir, Sohail Tanvir, Yasir Arafat, Danish Kaneria, Shahid Afridi, Kamran Akmal, Umar Gul, Mohammad Talha, Sohail Khan, Abdul Rauf, Saeed Ajmal, Sarfraz Ahmed.
It is amazing how people critisize others when they are out of the board and once they get in they end up selecting the same team. I dont see how the any of the selectors have made any different choices under Bari, Salu and now Abdul Qadir.
Also what burns my blood is seeing Afridi rewarded for his poor form in ODIs by getting a test call up. Excellent!
Also Asim Kamal is no way near the top scorer of the last two seasons and yet he gets another nod. What is the freaking criteria of these selection committes?I guess SAVE YOUR OWN SKIN.
Asim Kamal does deserve a spot. He has waited in the sidelines for too long as Captain’s favorite people got selected instead of him. With Shoaib Malik becoming captain, his hopes of taking over for Inzi’s spot in the middle got ruined. He has better stats in Test then most and we SO NEED a left-handed middle order bat who holds his wicket and doesnt throw it away. Plus he is a good player of spin bowling (Sri Lanka) has two of the world’s best spinners. Plus you need left handers against off-spinners. So I hope he gets selected in the final 11.
Here are some Asim Kamal stats:
Career summary Grouping Span Mat Inns NO Runs HS Ave BF SR 100 50 0 4s 6s
v Australia 2005-2005 1 2 0 97 87 48.50 172 56.39 0 1 0 16 0
v England 2005-2005 1 1 0 5 5 5.00 8 62.50 0 0 0 1 0
v India 2004-2005 5 8 1 353 91 50.42 723 48.82 0 4 0 54 4
v South Africa 2003-2003 2 3 0 138 99 46.00 317 43.53 0 1 0 18 1
v Sri Lanka 2004-2004 1 2 0 18 17 9.00 70 25.71 0 0 0 0 0
v West Indies 2005-2005 2 4 0 106 55 26.50 228 46.49 0 2 2 15 1
^ actually its the other way around...u need lefties against leg spinners and right handed batsmen against off spinners.
While Asim does have a decent record....we have Fawad Alam and Umer Amin doing extremely well in domestic cricket and I believe its about time we fast forward to the future instead of rewinding for help.
While Asim does have a decent record....we have Fawad Alam and Umer Amin doing extremely well in domestic cricket and I believe its about time we fast forward to the future instead of rewinding for help.
dont compare Fawad Alam with Asim Kamal. Asim is a specialist batsman and Fawad is a mere all rounder.
The way I see it, there is no room for Fawad Alam in the test team. Unless they decide to go with 5 Specialist batsmen, then you have to wonder whether it will be Afridi or Shoaib Malik at # 6. I sure hope not. The only genuine all rounder is the squad might be Yasir Arafat. Fawad Alam's bowling in not suited for test cricket. And Umar Amin is not even in the 22 probables.
I think this might be a good lineup.
Salman Butt
Khurram Manzoor
Younis Khan
Faisal Iqbal/Saeed Bin Nasir/Bazid Khan
Misbah-ul-Haq
Asim Kamal
Sarfraz Ahmed
Yasir Arafat/Sohail Khan
Umar Gul
Sohail Tanvir
Danish Kaneria
If they want 4 bowlers + an all-rounder. I think Yasir Arafat has done everything right and deserves a spot in the playing 11.
dont compare Fawad Alam with Asim Kamal. Asim is a specialist batsman and Fawad is a mere all rounder.
Fawad is NOT an all rounder. Our stupid selectors think of him as an all rounder. Fawad Alam has a first class batting average of 56, which is the highest in the country. He CAN roll his arm over a bit... but he is not an all rounder. He is captaining the NBP team in the QEA tournament at the moment and if you look at the scoreboards...you will notice he himself never bowls or if he does, its only 3-4 overs. There's currently no one in better form as a batsmen than Fawad Alam in our domestic cricket.
Fawad Alam is indeed an all rounder. He has not been given a chance to show his all round ability. He bowled regularly when he was playing U-19. Also bowled brilliantly in the 2006-07 T-20 competition. However he was not even given a chance to bowl on his ODI debut. He is sent too far down the order to bat when he plays for Pakistan that he cant really show his true colors. Plus he has never been used as an actual bowler either. The ball has been thrown to him to either speed up things or if Afridi and or Malik are going for too many runs. Once given a proper chance he would surley be able to justify his selection. By proper chance I dont been just play him in the ODI's but also send him a little higher up the order. Even Younis Khan was a lame duck when he was being sent in at #6 and #7 in the ODI's. Why expect Alam to be the next Bevan ?