Khaliq Malik: Pakistani wicketkeepers- a review (Aug 31 1996)

Wicket Keepers are a rare breed. It is very difficult to find a good one. Though they do the hardest work in the fielding side, they rarely ever get the recognition. Quick, acrobatic, agile is how you describe the best of the wicket keepers. There have been only a handful of wicket keepers in the history of cricket who could both bat for a high average and keep wickets tidely.

Of the Pakistani wicket keepers, Wasim Bari was perhaps the best in terms of wicket keeping. After starting his career at a tender age he went on to represent Pakistan in a total of 80 tests. Bari, as he was affectionately called, also captained Pakistan in 4 tests. Bari is one of the top 5 wicket keepers in terms of number of dismissals in the history of cricket.

Hanif Mohammad was the first Pakistani wicket keeper, keeping wicket for the first 3 tests of the inaugural test series versus India in 1952-53. Hanif then relinquished the job to Imtiaz Ahmed who was also on the team for the first 3 test matches, though not as the keeper. Imtiaz went on to score some 2000 runs in 41 tests for Pakistan including a first ever double ton by a Pakistani. From the number of dismissals per test one can ascertain that Imtiaz too was in the Wasim Bari league as a wicket keeper. He is certainly the best wicket-keeper batsman to date for Pakistan. To keep wickets and open inings at the same time takes a lot physically as mentally (as is the case with England`s Alec Stewart). So Imtiaz`s 2000 runs, most of them scored as an opener, look even better.

Pakistan seems to have tried quite a few wicket keepers at the end of Imtiaz Ahmed`s and Wasim Bari`s repective careers. Salim Yousuf, though not selected as often as he should have been, was one of the better wicket keepers of the modern era of cricket. Besides dismissing more than a hundred, Salim also scored more than a thousand runs (a double) including saving quite a few batting collapses.

These days, Pakistan can boast off two pretty good keepers. Rashid Latif brings back memories of Bari at his best. Rashid`s batting has not been fully exploited by the Pakistani captains, for he has shown glimpses of his ability to strike hard in the one day game, as well as a compact and correct technique for a test opener. In fact, he could be a more than useful opening batsman for both versions of the game. Moin Khan on the other hand has displayed a lot of grit and fighting spirit as a batsman (he has 3 hard fought test 100s to his name, all coming in situations when they were desperately needed by the side). His keeping, though, leaves a lot of room for improvement. Moin might be more suited as a specialist batsmen and a close in fielder (especially in the slips and gully positions).