The Story of Two Pathans......

[Maranello]

Yes, this was a herculean team effort, and everyone, even Sami and Yasir Hameed, did their bit very well.. they are all heroes and deserve plaudits, but maybe, the real heroes of this match, apart from the obvious Inzamam, are two Pathans, with vastly different styles, approaches and mindsets: Younis Khan and Shahid Khan Afridi. One a sensible, level-headed, intelligent, hard-working vice-captain from Mardan.... the other a hot-headed, tempetuous, street-fighting die-hard from the Khyber Agency. One grew up in cosmopolitan Karachi, and is the team's glamour boy and its hearththrob, complete with the ludicrous hair-do... whilst the other grew up in the harsh surrounds of the Frontier regions, still plays his domestic cricket in the Frontier and is a humble, modest and self-effacing gentleman, one who plays the game as it should be played... definitely not a glamour boy!

But both played with great heart, achieving everything for their country, and outplaying India's best ever team in its own backyard. Credit also to Inzi and Woolmer, for allowing both of them to play the second Test. After the face-saving draw at Mohali, they could have opted to play it safe and continue with Butt, but they opted to bring in some fire-power in the shape of Afridi. They could also have given in to loud public pressure to drop YK after Mohali, but they stuck to their guns and look how handsomely they have been rewarded.

Afridi's bowling was excellent in patches in the two Tests he played, though ordinary at other times. On the fifth day though, he was as close to unplayable as you can get on a relatively benign track. In four innings during this series, he snapped up the biggest wicket of all, that of Sachin Tendulkar, three times. Alongwith the peerless Glenn McGrath, a certain Pathan from Karachi can now also rightly say that the world's greatest batsman is his bunny! He bowled with great intelligence, using his variety, and some clever deceptions...if only he batted with so much brains!

And so to his batting...well what can I say that has not been already said.. The only reason Pakistan made such an excellent start on Day 4, was thanks to that man Afridi. He really batted like no one else can, especially against the Indian pace bowlers. No one, not even Kumble was shown any respect by the man from Karachi and Khyber, despite bowling very negatively. Pathan's first five overs went for 45; Balaji's three for 26. Ganguly had to try something different and so SRT was given the ball in the 11th over. Both Kumble and Tendulkar resorted to bowling leg spin aiming for the rough well outside the batsmen's legs, just to nullify the Afridi effect!

Well done Affers.

And Younis Khan...over 500 runs in the series, at an average over 100! When was the last time one of our guys got 500 in one series, and that too in a three Test series! 350 runs in the last Test alone. 2 excellent catches on the very last day. 100% commitment in the field, every minute of every day. Excellent support to Inzi as the vice-captain. Great perspective on life, so not getting too serious about what is still just a game. Tremendous levels of fitness, to still be running so hard for singles when on 260 odd... staggering levels of stamina to appear to be the most agile fielder on the 5th day today, after he has been in the field for almost 29 hours!* Astonishing really, this man is more defatigueable than the Duracell bunny....

The complete team player too, happy to do whatever his team wants. Open? Yes sir I will. Come in at number three? Of course. Bat at no.7 with the tail? Sure, why not. Field at first slip the whole day? With pleasure. Catch at short-leg? Would love to. Be the v/c and run the show with Inzi? For the team, yes. Keep wickets even though you hate it? Yes, of course I would. YK, for me, personifies the team ethic, and has done for a while, but I was never convinced about his batting technique and longevity till now. It is a pleasure to see that finally he merits a place in the side as a batsman too! An FPC** without a doubt ....

Two cricketing heroes to salute today...!


* He was in the dressing room only for the first 6 mins and the last 2 mins of our first innings, and then the first 62 mins of our second innings. That makes 70 mins in the dressing room over the full five days, and so the remaining time, he was out there in the field for over 29 hours, giving 100%. Astonishing....

** Future Pakistan Captain


PS: Apologies to those not familiar with Pakistan, some of the place names and ethnicities would be meaningless..but please do enquire!

[workkey]

there was also a third pathan there...Arshad khan

[Zainub]

There were 4 pathans in our team.

Yasir Hameed, Arshad Khan, Shahid Afridi and Younis Khan

There was one in the Indian team as well,

In principle, I cannot disagree with you at all M, this is arguably one of your best posts ever, or in my opinion anyway, I will request a copy of it in the Great Post sections as soon as I finish replying, althought there is one point that is debatable.

Originally Posted by M

the real heroes of this match, apart from the obvious Inzamam, are two Pathans, with vastly different styles, approaches and mindsets: Younis Khan and Shahid Khan Afridi. One a sensible, level-headed, intelligent, hard-working vice-captain from Mardan.... the other a hot-headed, tempetuous, street-fighting die-hard from the Khyber Agency. One grew up in cosmopolitan Karachi, and is the team's glamour boy and its hearththrob, complete with the ludicrous hair-do... whilst the other grew up in the harsh surrounds of the Frontier regions, still plays his domestic cricket in the Frontier and is a humble, modest and self-effacing gentleman, one who plays the game as it should be played... definitely not a glamour boy!

Afridi's hair do was completely barable up until he got it streaked, he is nevertheless as of today the only cricketer with a bad hair do I am such a big fan of. Although I admit sometimes the adds he appears in can be very annoying indeed. But he nevertheless makes it up with his cricket. I'm glad that he does a bit of sledging as well, especially since there is no Shaoib in the team now-a-days, and Sami only deals in silent sledging (or staring in other words).

I'm not quite sure though how apt the term 'self effacing and modest' is for Younis Khan. As much as I'm a fan of how he plays his cricket (ready to do anything for the team) I'm not exactly sure if that is quite the descriptive epithet his persona merits Recently he appeared in a popular televesion show dressed in a pink (pink????) t shirt and tight bleached jeans - he looked like he was trying to rival Shoaib in terms of bizarre dressing sense (out landish even) and that tv show he appeared in, not many 'self effacing and modest' characters appear in that, believe me.

He's ok, just like you would expect any young person of the 21st century to be, but he's no 'sharif admi' (which is my translation of a modest man) - Inzi is the perfect example of that kind of a person Plus he has the most annoying habbit of always chewing a gum (especially when he's batting) he's at it endlessly, sometimes I'm wondering why to date he has not managed not even a single contract with Ding Dong Bubble Gum

[Zainub]

Younis Khan was in the Hot Seat last Sunday. For those who don't know Hot Seat is a weekly column in the Magazine, Dawn, each week it features an interview of a local celeb. The questions are usally based around their fundamental theme of finding out the interviewee's tastes, particularly in books, music, movies, hobbies and personalities.

http://dawn.com/weekly/dmag/dmag10.htm

[Colourful Chaddi]

is irfan pathan is also pathan

[Zainub]

Don't know.

A Pathan is some one who has his origins in the North West Frontier Province of Pakistan. If Irfan's ancestors were from NWFP and the migrated to India for whatever reasons then Pathan is a Pathan but if he's just got the surname Pathan then I don't think so.