What "cornered tigers" speech?
Zahid Fazal is one of the forgotten members of Pakistan's 1992 World Cup winning team
Kanishkaa Balachandran
25-Feb-2013
Zahid Fazal is one of the forgotten members of Pakistan's 1992 World Cup winning team. Recalling the memorable tournament, he says that Imran Khan's famous "cornered tigers" speech was just a myth. The captain had a tiger t-shirt which was stuffed away at the bottom of his kitbag, which he wore during crunch games. Fazal also recounts Imran's single-minded belief that Pakistan would win, after they were written off. In the National, Tom Hussain tracks down Fazal in Sialkot, who works as a ticketing agent with Pakistan International Airlines.
"After we were bowled out for 74, we packed our bags [because we thought we were finished]. But Imran insisted we would still win the World Cup." Laughing, Fazal said his teammate Wasim Akram had joked that Khan, who would turn 40 later that same year, had "gone senile". What they hadn't appreciated was that their captain was motivated by a simmering anger that first surfaced when the Pakistan Cricket Board unveiled the team's uniform for the tournament's opening ceremony.
Kanishkaa Balachandran is a senior sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo