Irfan's early chokehold, Karachi's lack of muscle

Karachi Kings never arrived in their eliminator duel with Islamabad United on Saturday evening in Dubai. The match was a yawn in comparison to the low-scoring thrillers that the PSL has become familiar with.

Irfan delivers the first blow
Pakistan and Islamabad United fast bowler Mohammad Irfan delivered the perfect over when he had Karachi Kings opener Lendl Simmons in all sorts of trouble. Irfan, who was Man of the Match in the previous game against Lahore Qalandars, used Simmons' lack of footwork to his advantage by angling the ball away from the right-hander and deceived him by seaming the ball away from the bat. His best deliveries were the second and the fourth balls of the over, when he pitched the ball just back of length, closer to Simmons' body. Just as the bat came down the ball drifted away a little wide into the hands of wicketkeeper Brad Haddin. An excited Misbah-ul-Haq, the Islamabad captain, jumped up jubilantly, thinking Simmons had edged, but that was not the case. Still Misbah, Irfan and Islamabad were content. In a crucial match like this, starting with a maiden over was a strong psychological blow that pushed Karachi on the back foot straightaway.

The burden of being Shoaib Malik
Having announced that he was stepping down as captain of Karachi Kings a day before the eliminator against Islamabad United, Shoaib Malik knew he was drawing attention to himself when the intention was the opposite. Captaincy, Malik pointed out, was affecting his batting, fielding and bowling. His highest score in the group stage was 45. Playing only his fourth delivery, his second off Irfan, Malik swung wildly at a length ball and, instead of sailing into the stands, the ball took the bottom edge on its way to Haddin's gloves.

The art of the running
Power-hitting, ripping biceps and light, meaty bats are all part of the modern batsman's armory, especially in Twenty20 cricket. The art of running between the wickets, however, remains crucial in the shortest format. Running the single, converting ones into twos. Javed Miandad, Dean Jones, Sachin Tendulkar, Jonty Rhodes, MS Dhoni, AB de Villiers, to cite a few examples, showed us the art of stealing a single or a double if a batsman is pro-active in picking gaps and has the agility and fitness to push himself.

Essex team-mates and friends Ravi Bopara and Ryan ten Doeschate showed exactly that in their 49-run partnership for the fifth wicket. The Karachi pair ran eight twos, of which half seemed singles when the batsmen played the shot. Take this example: Bopara tapped a Dwayne Smith delivery lightly behind his legs and set off for a single. Irfan, alert, rushed to make sure the ball would not run away for a four. After two giant strides he realised a better option to stop the ball would be to make a sliding save. By the time Irfan had picked the ball, both batsmen were already halfway into their second run, and by the time the fielder released his throw Bopara and ten Doeschate had completed two runs without much fuss.

But where is the muscle, Karachi?
As assiduous as they were in their running, Bopara and ten Doeschate failed to get the odd big hit or create that one big over to swing the momentum towards Karachi. One thing Karachi need to keep in mind for the next season is the inclusion of a specialist T20 batsman who can clear boundaries effortlessly. Barring Simmons, there are no hard-hitting batsmen in their ranks. One common criticism is that Karachi have packed their squad with many allrounders and left-hand batsmen, but are missing a power-hitter. There is no one to match Chris Gayle, Shane Watson, Shahid Afridi or Andre Russell in their ranks and, against Islamabad, that absence was exposed thoroughly.

Sami delighted. Sami disappointed.
Mohammad Sami. The long run up is still there. He still steams in energetically. The pace has dipped by about five to six clicks. He has put on weight but says, with a smile, that he is eating the same food he has been eating for the last 20 years. He has not lost, however, his bowling acumen and an awareness of a batsman's strengths and weaknesses. Sami has been a catalyst for Islamabad so far with 10 wickets in five matches. Five of those victims were hunted down today against Karachi as Sami clocked his second-best T20 bowling performance with 4-0-8-5.

Extraordinary figures they may be but Sami did not bowl anything out of ordinary. He just maintained a disciplined line of attack and bowled smartly to exacerbate the pressure Karachi were already facing. The turning point of the match came in Sami's third over when Bopara pulled to deep square leg where Dwayne Smith charged in and plunged forward to pluck a beauty inches from the turf. Two balls later, ten Doeschate tried pulling a short ball on the off stump and was caught by Haddin. Sami took his T20 wickets tally to 101 by the end of the game and helped himself to his second Man-of-the-Match award in the tournament.

The bowler admitted he was disappointed not to find himself part of the Pakistan squad for the World T20 or Asia Cup. On evidence, Sami has been easily the most successful right-arm Pakistan fast bowler in the PSL. He has the right to be disappointed.