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Zimbabwe tour of Pakistan may not be big deal—but it’s a start after Sri Lanka tragedy
ENLARGE
Zimbabwe’s star batsman Sean Williams smashes a six against India during their World Cup match at Eden Park in Auckland on March 14. PHOTO: REUTERS
By
RICHARD LORD
There isn’t much to it—just two Twenty20 Internationals and three One Day Internationals over a week and a half, all played in
Lahore—but in its own way Zimbabwe’s trip to Pakistan from May 22 is as momentous as any international cricket tour.
That’s because it’s the first time an international team has visited Pakistan since the horrifying day in March 2009, also in Lahore, when 12 gunmen fired on the Sri Lankan team bus convoy as it approached the Gaddafi Stadium for the third day of the second Test. Six Pakistani policemen and two civilians were killed, and seven members of the Sri Lankan team were injured, as were match officials and team support staff.
Since then, Pakistan has played most of its home matches in the United Arab Emirates, after a brief flirtation with England as a home away from home.
The team has largely prospered in the UAE, with historic whitewashes of both England and Australia, but certain negative consequences are inevitable: crowds are far smaller; international players are isolated from the domestic game, with young players rarely sharing a team with established
internationals; and the Pakistan Cricket Board’s income is reduced, with knock-on effects on domestic standards.
Against that backdrop, it’s easy to see why everyone in Pakistan, from supporters to players to the board, is desperate for the team to play at home again, and why many feel abandoned by the international cricket community. But the last time the team played at home, people died, so the emphasis has to be on ensuring that any tour is safe first, and reviving Pakistan cricket second.
On the safety front, the news is mixed. It is of course impossible to judge the security situation in Pakistan from outside the country, and so Zimbabwe Cricket has sent a security assessment team to Pakistan that includes Chief Executive Alistair Campbell. The Federation of International Cricketers’ Associations has said that it is “very concerned” about the safety of officials because its experts still rate security in Pakistan as essentially unmanageable, whatever guarantees of safety are offered. The International Cricket Council is undertaking its own security assessment to decide whether to send ICC officials. If that report is favorable, it should act as a green light for the tour; even if it’s unfavorable, the tour can still go ahead with local officials, but if a place is unsafe for officials to travel, it’s unlikely that players should travel there either.
Some Zimbabwe players have said anonymously that they have concerns about touring Pakistan, but many of them are as individually impoverished as their board is collectively, and may not feel they have a lot of choice. Plus the rare chance to represent their country in an international engagement against high-quality opposition is not one to be missed.
It’s hard to make a living as a Zimbabwean cricketer, and as a result the team keeps losing its players, tempted overseas to play domestic cricket by better wages, more secure employment prospects and quite possibly more sympathetic bosses. The latest to join the great Zimbabwean talent drain is the team’s best player, and its former captain and wicketkeeper, the fearlessly attacking batsman Brendan Taylor. He called time on his international career at the age of 29 to join English county Nottinghamshire after a World Cup in which he was the fourth highest scorer, with 433 runs at an average of 72.16, including two centuries.
As well as losing its best batsman permanently, Zimbabwe has also lost its best bowler temporarily, with Tendai Chatara breaking his leg. The team’s dramatically reworked squad for the tour includes recalls for once promising left-arm quick Brian Vitori and big-hitting batsman Charles Coventry, along with opening batsman Vusi Sibanda, seamer Chris Mpofu and leg-spinner Graeme Cremer. A lot of batting responsibility will now fall on the shoulders of Hamilton Masakadza and Sean Williams.
Those players will at least be buoyed by the chance to face a Pakistan side at a distinct limited-overs low ebb after its disastrous tour of Bangladesh. Pakistan at least managed to win the second Test, after drawing the first from a leading position, but its inexperienced limited-overs sides also managed to lose every singe game of the tour: the three ODIs, the lone T20, and even the warm-up 50-over match against a Bangladesh Cricket Board XI.
Pakistan’s limited-overs strength recently has been its bowling: its spinners for several years, and more recently its seamers during the World Cup. But in three ODIs against Bangladesh, its entire attack managed just 10 wickets, in addition to one run-out, while conceding 820 runs. With Junaid Khan not yet back in his groove after injury, there’s little seam support for Wahab Riaz, while star spinner Saeed Ajmal is clearly nowhere near his best after remodeling his action. He was even dropped from the Bangladesh Tests.
The return to bowling of Mohammad Hafeez, apparently relatively unharmed compared to most who have been suspended for irregular actions, at least means Pakistan will presumably no longer persist with its recent habit of only picking four front-line bowlers and trying to make up the remainder with a collection of part-timers of dubious bowling credentials.
Pakistan’s limited-overs batting looks immeasurably weakened by the absence of elder statesmen and most reliable batsmen Misbah-ul-Haq and Younis Khan. New ODI captain Azhar Ali batted well in the Bangladesh series, but had only intermittent support from the rest of the batting line-up.
An entirely different, skittish, unsettled Mohammad Hafeez seems to turn up from the confident, quietly destructive character who opens the batting in Tests, while the rest of the team’s ODI batsmen are varying shades of green. PCB chairman Shaharyar Khan has called the team’s fitness levels unacceptable, with the exception of Misbah and Younis, at 40 and 37 the two oldest members of the Test team in Bangladesh. He added that Pakistan’s domestic cricket isn’t generating internationally match-fit players; the lack of home international cricket certainly doesn’t help.
Pakistan may be struggling, but playing at home in front of what should be massive, rapturous crowds, against a struggling side shorn of its best batsman and bowler, is as good a place as any to start the turnaround. The most important result to watch out for on this tour, however, will not be the one on the pitch.
Pakistan Cricket Is Coming Home - WSJ
Zimbabwe’s star batsman Sean Williams smashes a six against India during their World Cup match at Eden Park in Auckland on March 14. PHOTO: REUTERS
By
RICHARD LORD
There isn’t much to it—just two Twenty20 Internationals and three One Day Internationals over a week and a half, all played in
Lahore—but in its own way Zimbabwe’s trip to Pakistan from May 22 is as momentous as any international cricket tour.
That’s because it’s the first time an international team has visited Pakistan since the horrifying day in March 2009, also in Lahore, when 12 gunmen fired on the Sri Lankan team bus convoy as it approached the Gaddafi Stadium for the third day of the second Test. Six Pakistani policemen and two civilians were killed, and seven members of the Sri Lankan team were injured, as were match officials and team support staff.
Since then, Pakistan has played most of its home matches in the United Arab Emirates, after a brief flirtation with England as a home away from home.
The team has largely prospered in the UAE, with historic whitewashes of both England and Australia, but certain negative consequences are inevitable: crowds are far smaller; international players are isolated from the domestic game, with young players rarely sharing a team with established
internationals; and the Pakistan Cricket Board’s income is reduced, with knock-on effects on domestic standards.
Against that backdrop, it’s easy to see why everyone in Pakistan, from supporters to players to the board, is desperate for the team to play at home again, and why many feel abandoned by the international cricket community. But the last time the team played at home, people died, so the emphasis has to be on ensuring that any tour is safe first, and reviving Pakistan cricket second.
On the safety front, the news is mixed. It is of course impossible to judge the security situation in Pakistan from outside the country, and so Zimbabwe Cricket has sent a security assessment team to Pakistan that includes Chief Executive Alistair Campbell. The Federation of International Cricketers’ Associations has said that it is “very concerned” about the safety of officials because its experts still rate security in Pakistan as essentially unmanageable, whatever guarantees of safety are offered. The International Cricket Council is undertaking its own security assessment to decide whether to send ICC officials. If that report is favorable, it should act as a green light for the tour; even if it’s unfavorable, the tour can still go ahead with local officials, but if a place is unsafe for officials to travel, it’s unlikely that players should travel there either.
Some Zimbabwe players have said anonymously that they have concerns about touring Pakistan, but many of them are as individually impoverished as their board is collectively, and may not feel they have a lot of choice. Plus the rare chance to represent their country in an international engagement against high-quality opposition is not one to be missed.
It’s hard to make a living as a Zimbabwean cricketer, and as a result the team keeps losing its players, tempted overseas to play domestic cricket by better wages, more secure employment prospects and quite possibly more sympathetic bosses. The latest to join the great Zimbabwean talent drain is the team’s best player, and its former captain and wicketkeeper, the fearlessly attacking batsman Brendan Taylor. He called time on his international career at the age of 29 to join English county Nottinghamshire after a World Cup in which he was the fourth highest scorer, with 433 runs at an average of 72.16, including two centuries.
As well as losing its best batsman permanently, Zimbabwe has also lost its best bowler temporarily, with Tendai Chatara breaking his leg. The team’s dramatically reworked squad for the tour includes recalls for once promising left-arm quick Brian Vitori and big-hitting batsman Charles Coventry, along with opening batsman Vusi Sibanda, seamer Chris Mpofu and leg-spinner Graeme Cremer. A lot of batting responsibility will now fall on the shoulders of Hamilton Masakadza and Sean Williams.
Those players will at least be buoyed by the chance to face a Pakistan side at a distinct limited-overs low ebb after its disastrous tour of Bangladesh. Pakistan at least managed to win the second Test, after drawing the first from a leading position, but its inexperienced limited-overs sides also managed to lose every singe game of the tour: the three ODIs, the lone T20, and even the warm-up 50-over match against a Bangladesh Cricket Board XI.
Pakistan’s limited-overs strength recently has been its bowling: its spinners for several years, and more recently its seamers during the World Cup. But in three ODIs against Bangladesh, its entire attack managed just 10 wickets, in addition to one run-out, while conceding 820 runs. With Junaid Khan not yet back in his groove after injury, there’s little seam support for Wahab Riaz, while star spinner Saeed Ajmal is clearly nowhere near his best after remodeling his action. He was even dropped from the Bangladesh Tests.
The return to bowling of Mohammad Hafeez, apparently relatively unharmed compared to most who have been suspended for irregular actions, at least means Pakistan will presumably no longer persist with its recent habit of only picking four front-line bowlers and trying to make up the remainder with a collection of part-timers of dubious bowling credentials.
Pakistan’s limited-overs batting looks immeasurably weakened by the absence of elder statesmen and most reliable batsmen Misbah-ul-Haq and Younis Khan. New ODI captain Azhar Ali batted well in the Bangladesh series, but had only intermittent support from the rest of the batting line-up.
An entirely different, skittish, unsettled Mohammad Hafeez seems to turn up from the confident, quietly destructive character who opens the batting in Tests, while the rest of the team’s ODI batsmen are varying shades of green. PCB chairman Shaharyar Khan has called the team’s fitness levels unacceptable, with the exception of Misbah and Younis, at 40 and 37 the two oldest members of the Test team in Bangladesh. He added that Pakistan’s domestic cricket isn’t generating internationally match-fit players; the lack of home international cricket certainly doesn’t help.
Pakistan may be struggling, but playing at home in front of what should be massive, rapturous crowds, against a struggling side shorn of its best batsman and bowler, is as good a place as any to start the turnaround. The most important result to watch out for on this tour, however, will not be the one on the pitch.
Pakistan Cricket Is Coming Home - WSJ
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