Misbah-ul-haq: Pakistan’s Delight

Misbah-ul-Haq may have been unpardonably guilty of playing an irresponsible shot in the T20 World Cup final. But in the ongoing Test series, he has proved to be Pak’s delight and India’s blight. He unfortunately ran himself out in the Delhi Test. I wonder if India would have won the Delhi Test had he not been dismissed in such tragicomic circumstances. He certainly was looking good for more than his 82 suggested. He has pulled the chestnuts out of the fire for Pakistan both in Kolkata and Bangalore with unbeaten innings of 161 and 133.

He grafts for runs, quite unlike the Misbah we all saw in T20 WC. He has shown remarkable adaptability between two formats of the game which players of his age struggle to achieve. The fact that the holy Indian trinity opted out of the T20 World Cup is proof enough that it is widely believed to be a game of the spring chickens. So,where was Misbah all these years? Players at 32 must be contemplating about the opportune moment to hang up the boots. But he has shown a rare consistency. He has scored two back-to-back hundreds in extremely precarious situations that make his innings worth more than their weight in gold. The obvious conclusion is that Misbah is a victim of Pakistan’s deeply politicised selection policies.

At least in India, it is not as crassly political despite the zonal selection system and that’s perhaps why our bench strength is improving.

This entry was posted on Friday, December 14th, 2007 and is filed under Pakistan Cricket. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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