Hassan Cheema
Pakistanis should stop crying fixing
The obsessive tendency to paint players as corrupt following every defeat has served to deflect attention from the team's real problems
Hassan Cheema
05-Feb-2015
When asked by a group of journalists what happens to Pakistan in World Cup games against India, Aamer Sohail's response was immediate. "Nothing happens to them in the ground" he said, followed by a pause, and then, "whatever happens, happens off the field." It's the sort of thing that could have a hundred different meanings, but Sohail's knowing smile and the cackles from the journalists hinted at the one thing any such suggestion, especially by a cricketer from Pakistan's '90s generation, tends to hint at.
Immediately, it became headline news (or "Breaking News", according to the cable news channels), and soon Sohail would respond that he didn't mean what everyone thought he meant; even if the video can now be found under headlines such as "Aamer Sohail hints at purported 'fixing' of India-Pakistan matches." In a vignette, one saw why Sohail is referred to as Sarfraz Nawaz 2.0 (who is not just the boy who cried wolf but the boy who can only cry wolf), but also why the national team will never get this particular monkey off its back.
Pakistan and India didn't play each other in the World Cup until 1992. Pakistan have lost all five head-to-head matches since. Each of those losses has been explained with the same excuse. By 1992, rumours of Pakistan's supposed dishonesty had already taken root in the minds of their fans. But it was really with Javed Miandad and Imran Khan's departures (excluding Miandad's return in 1996) that the floodgates opened. Two of the three most senior players at the time (Wasim Akram and Saleem Malik), and the two who would lead Pakistan in the majority of their ODIs and Tests until the Qayyum Report, ended up with their legacies tarnished by these allegations; the third would stand as one of the few not stained by those charges, and ended up being referred to as Mr Clean in certain circles.
Full postPakistan's dot-ball problem
They seem to be hung up on what worked for the team in the 1992 World Cup, not realising that the rest of the world has moved past those strategies
Hassan Cheema
20-Jan-2015
England's success in the 1966 World Cup went against everything English football had stood for till then. In the '50s, the stars of the game had been big burly centre- forwards and tricky wingers who played a major role in making football the most popular game in the country.
And yet, a dozen years on, for Sir Stanley Matthews' finest hour, England won the World Cup with a formation that would become the norm in the land: the 4-4-2 with side-midfielders instead of the old-fashioned wing-forwards. That team came to be known as "the wingless wonders". England won because they decided to innovate and move with the times.
But the irony is that in the following half-century they have continued indulging in the unhealthy obsession of that 4-4-2 formation. What was once a great innovation has been stuck to religiously even as the rest of the world has moved on.
Full postWhy Pakistan domestic cricket inspires pessimism
Less-deserving players have been picked for the Pentangular and A squads at the expense of talented allrounders
Hassan Cheema
03-Jan-2015
December is usually the time of the year when Pakistanis living abroad return. Over the course of this winter, several of my returning friends have wondered how I, for so long the torchbearer of optimism regarding Pakistani cricket within our tiny circles, had become as disillusioned as the Grinch. A look at what happened last month alone might provide a glimpse into why every Pakistani cricket journalist is as cynical as Diogenes.
In December, Kenya arrived in Pakistan to play five one-dayers against Pakistan A. They were the first team, with the exception of Afghanistan, that had visited these shores since the terror attack on Sri Lankan team in Lahore in 2009. All five matches were played in that city. It was a landmark series.
With the national team struggling just before the World Cup, it was a chance for those looking in from the outside to stake a claim. Sure, as some suggested, Kenya weren't much better than the worst first-class team in Pakistan, but in a country where it's not how much you perform but when you perform that matters, this series was important. In front of the national selectors, at the PCB headquarters, with the matches on television, it seemed an obvious chance for these players to put their hands up. Just a month earlier Nasir Jamshed had been drafted into the national team based on one good series for Pakistan A against UAE, though he had performed poorly across all formats in the domestic game for 18 months.
Full postThe problem with Pakistan's World Cup preparations
Most of their matches are at venues that will suit their style of play, but their strategy is directed at tackling bouncier pitches
Hassan Cheema
23-Dec-2014
One topic has obsessed the Pakistan cricket team, and those who bang on about it, in the past few months: the World Cup is coming. And the fact that it's going to be in Australia, so the team better be ready for it. After all, Australia represents all that is foreign to the Pakistani player, especially the batsmen. It is almost heartening to see the amount of thought Pakistan are putting - or pretending to put - into the tournament that defines eras. Good teams are sullied by one bad week (Inzamam-ul-Haq and Bob Woolmer's lot spring to mind), and mediocre ones are later regarded with mistaken nostalgia if they over-achieve.
Pakistan's squads over the past year have been picked based on what's scheduled for the following year. According to Fawad Alam's detractors, while he may succeed in Asian conditions, he will be found out in Australia with its bouncier, faster pitches, where he may struggle with the shorter ball, and on bigger grounds, where his lack of power will be exposed. Similarly Wahab Riaz is selected over those who have outperformed him in the domestic game because his pace will be an asset on Australian pitches.
Mohammad Irfan, the latest talisman for Pakistan, has even been rested over the past six months, just to protect him for the World Cup. It is pertinent to note here that while rotation and resting might be the norm throughout the world, it is alien for the Pakistani cricketer. And then there was the final straw: Sarfraz Ahmed, Pakistan's in-form batsman and someone who has succeeded at the top of the order, was sent in at No. 7 in the first ODI against New Zealand because, according to Misbah-ul-Haq, Pakistan are looking to use him in that role in Australia, as their late-order hitter.
Full postPakistan's ODI batting a decade behind the rest
The return to tried-and-tested underperformers for the World Cup squad will undo all the good work done over the last 14 months
Hassan Cheema
10-Dec-2014
The loss to Sri Lanka in the fourth ODI constituted England's 16th loss in 27 ODIs - almost a return to the '90s.
England are quite possibly the worst batting team in the world right now. Since the last Champions Trophy none of the other top eight nations has a lower average than them, and the only ones with lower run rates are Pakistan and West Indies.
In fact, since the start of 2006, only Pakistan and West Indies have a lower run rate than England. Since the start of 2007 Pakistan, West Indies and New Zealand are the only teams worse than England in terms of average. Unsurprisingly these four are also the bottom four in terms of win-loss record over this period too.
Full postPakistan's favourite whipping boys
Even when they were at their worst, Pakistan had no trouble beating New Zealand
Hassan Cheema
13-Nov-2014
One of the more reproduced sections from Roy Keane's recently released autobiography refers to the team talk by Sir Alex Ferguson before a match against Tottenham.
"I thought I knew what the group might need, that we didn't need a big team talk. It was Tottenham at home. I thought, please don't go on about Tottenham, we all know what Tottenham is about, they are nice and tidy but we'll f****** do them. He came in and said: 'Lads, it's Tottenham', and that was it. Brilliant."
It relates to the image of Tottenham being a particularly flaky and soft team, and one that could never stand up to the Manchester United of Keane and Ferguson; it's a viewpoint they have generally reinforced since Keane's playing days.
When Tottenham won at Old Trafford in 2012, it was their first victory against Manchester United for 11 years, and their first at United's ground for 23.
Full postThe second coming of Team Misbah
The current side calls forth memories of the golden era of 2010-12
Hassan Cheema
03-Nov-2014
There was a lot that Pakistan lost in the summer of 2010. They lost a series against England; they lost two captains, their two best pacers and some of their integrity. It could have been easy to lose hope as well, particularly when barely a month later Zulqarnain Haider abandoned the team mid-tour. They had failed to win any of their previous eight Test series since beating West Indies in 2006, and their fortunes looked bleak. To add to that, they had won only one of their previous ten away series, and considering they could no longer play at home it would have been easy to fold there and then. But instead, with Waqar Younis and Misbah-ul Haq in charge of the Test team (and Shahid Afridi with the ODI squad) Pakistan went on a run that would have been hugely impressive with the full-strength Test squad, or even the team of the 1990s, and quite simply remarkable with the talent available.
Over the course of about a year and a half following that summer, Pakistan played seven Test series, winning five and drawing two. It was the longest unbeaten streak of series they had had since the late '80s, and the first time they had won four in a row since 1994. And the men who made it possible made you doubt everything you had learnt about Pakistani cricket.
The Pakistani player in the post-Imran era was brash, aggressive and disturbingly young. Nearly every one of the greats of the mighty '90s side made his debut as a teenager. It was a trend that continued even when it seemed it had stopped paying dividends. The lost generation of the 2000s could blame their careers on how early they were thrown into the bear pit. Several of them had been outlined as potential Pakistan players when they were still boys - in the 1996 Lombard Under-15 Challenge Cup, Taufeeq Umar, Hasan Raza, Bazid Khan, Faisal Iqbal, Kamran Akmal, Shoaib Malik and Yasir Arafat all played for the Pakistan team that finished runners-up. Every one of them, with the exception of Bazid, would eventually make their international debuts at 20 or younger. Each of them could be accused of failing to fulfill his potential. Add the likes of Danish Kaneria (who debuted at the age of 19) and Pakistan's lost generation seemed to be posing a question to the very core of the beliefs of Pakistani cricket. Perhaps the decades-old strategy of throwing children into the pool and judging them by whether they swam or sank wasn't ideal in the modern, increasingly professional game.
Full postThe Champions League should shed its elitism
The tournament would have greater context if it started including composite teams featuring promising Associate players from teams like Afghanistan and Ireland
Hassan Cheema
05-Oct-2014
And so the Champions League T20 comes to an end. Of the four semi-finalists, three were IPL sides, joined by the token BBL franchise. For the fourth time out of six the champions are from India; the other two times it has been an Australian team walking away with the winner's trophy. Sometimes even the worst-laid plans of men and mice don't go astray.
The conclusion would be that Australians and Indians are better than the rest of the world at T20. This is an argument that starts to crumble once you look at World T20 records: since the first tournament in 2007, India have failed to reach the semi-finals in three of the following four editions, and Australia are yet to win it. There is nothing, at least on the international stage, that separates these two from the rest. On the local stage, though, there quite obviously is.
They may not have the most talent but they do have the most money; and increasingly that is all that matters.
Full postThe Lahoris in the Champions League
They don't quite inspire the awe that their legendary predecessors did, but they will do well if they keep the cricketing traditions of the city alive
Hassan Cheema
14-Sep-2014
For four decades, from independence onwards, Pakistan cricket was divided neatly between its two great cities. Karachi provided the spine and Lahore everything else.
The Karachi cricketer was a gutsy street fighter who put a bigger price on his wicket than he would on his own head. From Hanif Mohammad to Javed Miandad, the Karachi batsman was the one around whom Pakistan built their batting. The city also provided the conventional spinner and the wicketkeeper - in between Lahoris Imtiaz Ahmed, who played his last Test in 1962, and Kamran Akmal, who became the first-choice wicketkeeper in 2004, Pakistan had a Karachi-born wicketkeeper in 234 of their 258 Test matches.
Lahore was different. The areas of expertise you find there would be those you find in mining towns, the bush, or whatever the equivalent for the outback is in your country. Lahore isn't a city; it's the biggest village humanity has ever known. And its cricketers represent that.
Full postPakistan can't handle pressure in ODI deciders
Forget South Africa, it's Pakistan who have tripped up in high-pressure matches for a decade now
Hassan Cheema
04-Sep-2014
The third ODI against Sri Lanka could have marked the continuation of a quiet revolution in Pakistani ODI cricket over the last 14 months. Had they won, it would have been their fourth series win in six, to go along with reaching the final of the Asia Cup - easily their best run under Misbah-ul-Haq. And it's a revolution led by Umar Akmal, Ahmed Shehzad and, particularly, Fawad Alam. These three, along with Sohaib Maqsood, weren't considered good enough to even be in Pakistan's squad for the Champions Trophy last summer; and now they were the ones making some people even question Misbah's place in the side.
Instead the third ODI proved to be the continuation of a far longer and more worrisome trend: Pakistan just can't deal with pressure.
They have now lost 11 of the 12 bilateral series deciders (BSDs for the purpose of this article) they have played since 2003. And they have also lost six of eight tournament finals since beating Zimbabwe in April 2003. Pakistan have spent a decade showing the sort of nerve that would make South Africa blush without it becoming a truly big deal. Add their record in ICC tournaments during this time (one win in four knockout matches) and the suspicion of a trend is only reinforced.
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