Owais Mughal
After winning the series against Sri Lanka 2-1, Pakistan cricket team seems to be getting its groove back.
And so is Shahid Afridi who was once again the star for Pakistan. While he was more brilliant with the ball, he did also reach a new batting milestone.
During the first match of current Pakistan versus Sri Lanka One Day International series in Abu Dhabi, UAE, Shahid Afridi completed his 5000 career runs. This was Shahid Afridi ‘s 239th match and 227th innings.
He thus became the 8th cricketer of Pakistan to complete 5000 or more runs in ODIs.
Here is the list of 10 most prolific career run getters for Pakistan in ODIs.
1. Inzamam-ul-Haq 11739 runs at 39.52 runs/inning
2. Saeed Anwar 8823 at 39.21
3. M Yousuf 7957 at 41.22
4. Javed Miandad 7381 at 41.7
5. Saleem Malik 7170 at 32.88
6. Ijaz Ahmed 6564 at 32.33
7. Rameez Raja 5841 at 32.09
8. Shahid Afridi 5072 at 23.37
9. Aamer Sohail 4780 at 31.86
10. Abdul Razzak 4465 at 29.96
Shahid Afridi now also holds the world Record strike rate in ODIs. Following is the list of only players in the world with greater than 100% strike rate. Qualification is atleast 20 innings. Amazingly Afridi has maintained this strike rate after 228 innings. His closest rival has played only 25 innings.
1. Shahid Afridi 228 innings, 5072 runs at a strike rate of 109.38 %
2. JM Davison (Canada) 25 innings, 693 runs at a strike rate of 108.45%
3. AM Blignaut (Zimbabwe) 40, 625, 106.65%
4. BL Cairns (NewZealand) 65, 987, 104.88%
5. DR Smith (WestIndies) 52, 766, 101.32%
6. AR Adams (New Zealand) 34, 419, 100.47%
Previous ATP posts on Shahid Afridi:
We had lost to srilanka by 115 runs in the third match.
Well played Shoaib, a captains innings,
we as always proved ourselves to be a non-consistent performer.
By the way, It was a shame to hear Afridi saying that he was playing ‘good’as there were
many pathans in the spectators.
Just a week after 12th May, his statement failed to create any positive impact.
inzi, saeed, salim, ijaz = justice qayum report = dodgy characters
what a shame, such enormous talent being wasted and humiliating themselves.
As we know Sri Lankan were not palying with full force. Their best palyers Vaas and Murali are not in the team. Jaysuriya didn’t play in seond one day. What I see this series is scheduled to boost our team’s morale. I hope afte practicing in this series, we will perform well in coming series against big guns.
Afridi is a casual player and I would call him GULLI DANDA palyer because he doesn’t bat sensibly and try to hit each ball blindly. This attiude is called “TUKKA” and when it worked he made runs and his record sixes and when it doesn’t work, he failed. That’s why his average is lowest in top ten Pakistanis run makers. He is only good as entertainer and not as professional player. Please read my comments on Shahid Afridi in my old post http://www.mypakistan.com/?p=316 when Pakistan was on India’s tour.
the most heartening thing about the last two matches is how well Pakistan’s less celebrated players have performed. After a long time, our openers did not disappoint. I hope this is a sign of things to come, too early to decide. Remember Pakistan had an awesome streak of successes back in 2005-06 time frame and then the whole thing went bust.
No doubt Afridi played well in both the matches, but the basic problem with the team is it keep repeating mistakes.
How Afridi got out in the second one dayer was definitely not the right choice at that time. It almost lost the match for Pakistan.
Pakistani team has done some positive things. Inclusion of Salman and Yasir is a very good step. Captain seems fine and fit for the role. But note that we still have no debutants which means no future planning.
Kamran Akmal has been there for ages , and the selectors should really have rested him in this low profile series and a youngster should have been given a chance.
Another interesting decision from the selectors is to have a drug addicted vice captain which certainly doesnt play very well on the minds of our ICC friends.
Although Sami , Gul and Asif seem to be a good combination, Rao Iftikhar was doing very well also and should have been in the team. Even if that meant at the cost of an all rounder. On the other hand we could have had an all rounder like Abdul Rehman in place of Muhammad Yousuf.
Playing Muhammad Yousaf who , i seriously doubt , would be part of the next world cup is a blunder. Also it seems its time for Razzak to go. He is way too lazy about his cricket. We need to bring up another batsman and all rounder for the future.
The pitches in Abu Dahabi suited Pakistan. That is what they usually like – Flat and low bounce. The real test would be against a team like Australia on a bouncy and green track.
Sri Lanka , although reached the final , did not play full strength and most of their guys were not very enthusiastic about the Abu Dahabi series.
Lots of mistakes were made in both matches but thankfully none of them hurt enough for us to lose the match. However you dont get a second chance against Team Australia.
Lets see what pakistan does today , specially with the team selection. The captain said that he will give chance to new players. I would really want to see which guys he drops? Or in other words how many seniors are rested for the last match.