Which pace bowler...

[Shaka]

Originally Posted by Maranello

Shaka, I agree, was quite impressed with Rana Naved's bowling with the new ball today, he did get very effective swing against both Jayasuriya and Jayantha...

If Shabbir and Gul are both not fit...I would think that Naved should be tried in the Test team...on current form, he is a better bet than Mr. Akhtar!

The only downside to that is I'm not sure how effective Rana will be when the shine is off the new ball. Maybe he should be given a chance to show what he can do at the expense of either Sami or Shoaib. If Shoaib puts in another stint like yesterday in tomorrow's final, then I can't see him playing the tests.

[Shaka]

Something that's concerned me for some time about Pakistan's bowling in ODI's has been the poor bowling in the final 8 overs. In the past Wasim and Waqar used to get a lot of wickets by bowling fast yorkers at the death, but neither Sami or Shoaib seem to be able to do this. Shoaib after a good opening spell came back at the end, got pasted for 15 in one remarkably stupid over and that was the end of him.

Sami and Shoaib have both been playing enough ODI cricket to know by now that you bowl full and straight yet for some reason they seem to think their way is better than tried and tested common knowledge.

[Maranello]

Yes I think from the current lot Afridi, Malik and Naved are much better bets than Sami and Shoaib for the last 8 overs... A few years ago, Saqlain was excellent in that role, picking up a lot of wickets at the end and drying up the runs by mixing it cleverly and bowling to a plan... and Afridi did that today, I think Malik could as well.

[Shaka]

I think Malik maybe hasn't got Afridi's variety so he might get punished in the death overs. Naved Rana though bowled quite well in the last game and was unlucky with edges flying to the boundary. He did at least look like he was thinking about where he wanted to bowl.

[Maranello]

Lets see how Asif and Khalil do Down Under. Two guys who weren't in our earlier detailed discussion in this thread, and in fact were not even in our A-Team selections, we had preferred Abdur Rauf, Waqar and Irshad.