How Bangladesh’s plucky keeper-bat rescued a shaky innings to set up their series win

Mohammad Isam25-May-2021The talk around Dhaka for the last couple of days was about the cyclone brewing in the Bay of Bengal. There was heavy rain on the eve of the match, and plenty more was forecast during the second ODI on Tuesday. Mushfiqur Rahim was aware of his surroundings, and made a mental note of switching on and off, according to the interruptions.An elite sportsperson will tell you when they are in that fabled “zone”, few things can pull them out of it. It could be especially tough for someone who has spent more time in a bio-bubble than at home in the last eight months.When the rain interrupted play for the first time, Rahim had to wait nearly half-an-hour on 84. Shortly afterwards when he moved to 96, there was a second downpour. Then, Bangladesh faced a difficult last 10 overs – they were already seven down with Rahim being the last recognised batter.But he made his final 29 runs off just 16 balls to take the game away from Sri Lanka, who had Bangladesh on the mat at 184 for 7. Rahim went on to score 50 of the 62 runs Bangladesh made from that point.”My main target was to bat for 50 overs, regardless of how much runs we get in the end,” Rahim said. “I felt 246 was a fighting score on this wicket. The more important thing was that I was mentally prepared to switch on and switch off due to the weather. I am happy with the innings, but we missed out on the last eleven balls, and in a close contest, those 10-20 runs becomes crucial for us. I want to improve my batting more.”That it came during a rescue act – Bangladesh were 15 for 2 after losing Tamim Iqbal and Shakib Al Hasan – must have been more satisfying.”We always try to lose fewer wickets in the first ten overs but I think it is quite normal to lose early wickets against the new ball,” he said. “We always practice against the new ball, so it wasn’t anything new for me. We looked to bat out the first five or six overs.”There was more pace and bounce on the wicket than the first ODI. The ball was coming on to the bat. I told Liton (Das) that we can shift the momentum by playing to the merit of the ball for those early five to seven overs. We planned to get 20-odd runs at that stage. Liton was batting well but unfortunately got out.”Having spoken about how he approached his knock, Rahim then touched upon how he’d like the next crop of batters, like Das, Afif Hossain and Mosaddek Hossain to approach their innings. He underlined the need to be selective in their shot-making.”I think if a team has seven or eight performers, the team will more often than not come out on top if they perform regularly,” he said. “After Tamim and Shakib got out early, there was an opportunity for Liton, Afif and Mosaddek, who got a chance. They are trying but they have to be more selective. One has to know when to play a low-risk and when to play a high-risk shots on this type of wicket.”I hope they become more matured, but I’d be pleased if they can quickly take a lesson from here. It makes things difficult when the pressure comes upon us in big and normal matches. If they start contributing, Bangladesh will become a stronger one-day team.”These batters don’t have to go too far to find a playbook for such batting. They can have a look at the footage of Rahim’s 84 and 125 in these two matches. Particularly in this innings, Rahim’s wagon wheel was perfectly in tune with what was bowled at him, on a two-paced pitch, and the team’s need.He took singles and twos all around the wicket, but when it came to the boundaries, he understood where to hit hard and when to use the pace. He struck only three fours through the covers and one lofted hit down the ground. The rest came with tickles down third-man, a glide through fine-leg to reach his century, and using Dushmantha Chameera and Isuru Udana’s pace to paddle sweep fours through backward square-leg.”Like every century, this too is a special innings if the team wins,” he said. “It contributed to our first ODI series win over Sri Lanka, so it will inspire me to do better in the coming days.”Rahim however is known for being straightforward, and he didn’t let the chance to pass to talk about his reverse sweep, which garnered some attention after he got out playing the shot in the first game. He didn’t play a single one in the second ODI, but promised there will be more reverse sweeps coming up.”The reverse sweep is one of my favourite shots, and one of my go-to shots. If the situation arises, I can play four or five reverse sweeps, not just one.”

Wicketkeeper-batsman is still confident hosts can win in Rawalpindi

Danyal Rasool07-Feb-2021This might have been a hundred Mohammad Rizwan was waiting for, but there was once a time the idea of a No. 6 Pakistan batsman reaching three-figures was something of a banality. Four years ago, Asad Shafiq struck a 137 in an inspired attempt to chase down 490 at Fortress Gabba – or so we called it then – as Pakistan came excruciatingly close to a stunning Test match victory. In one of Pakistan’s strongest middle orders, Shafiq had nestled himself in at No. 6 and more than made it his own; that century took him past Garry Sobers as the man with most centuries from that position.There was little hope of him getting a look-in at that time, but the seed of Rizwan’s maiden Test match hundred may have been sown in those days when Shafiq’s attractive strokeplay was something Pakistan could take for granted. Comparisons may be both premature and exaggerated, but there are shades of Shafiq in Rizwan’s technique at the crease: the economical backlift, the full, open face of the bat, and the reliance on sweet timing. Their physical attributes are uncannily similar too, and with Rizwan tasked with filling in Shafiq’s (metaphorically) large shoes, there was only one man to seek out for advice.”You have to learn how to bat with the tail if you bat where I do,” Rizwan told a press conference after Sunday’s play in Rawalpindi. “This is international cricket, and at this level you can’t afford to make any excuses. At this batting position, our record holder is Asad Shafiq, who has performed in this position for several years for us. Our tour manager Shahid Aslam said I needed to learn a lot of things from Asad. I watched what he did and batting with the tail is very tricky. So I discussed some of those points that Asad taught me, and kept those in mind and utilised them.”If Shafiq is indeed the primary driver behind Rizwan’s rich recent vein of form – the wicketkeeper-batsman has five half-centuries and a hundred in his last nine Test innings – it bodes rather well for a future in coaching. Few from the outside, however, could claim credit for the application Rizwan would show when he came in to bat under pressure, as he so often tends to do. Walking out in the twilight on Saturday on what Rizwan called an “unplayable” pitch, South Africa swarmed over the hosts, and with Pakistan reduced to 76 for 5, and then 143 for 7, the knowledge of how to bat with the tail was not only handy but downright crucial.”When we were batting yesterday, it was an unplayable pitch, everyone could see that. It was a difficult time, and there were edges and streaky runs, but bravery is always rewarded,” Rizwan said. “If not for the grace of God, I would have been dismissed and I wouldn’t be sat here in front of you. At that point, we thought that a target of 240-260 would be fine. But this morning, the pitch eased up and I found more my faith in my team-mates, even the lower-order batsmen, increasing. That was a huge factor in us stretching that target to 370.”It may only be a statistic, but no batsman ever downplays the importance of their maiden hundred, not least when those runs come on inscrutable pitches like these. While Rizwan produced half-centuries in Australia, England and New Zealand in situations where his side were under the cosh, it may not have escaped people’s attention that none of those runs actually helped Pakistan to a Test match victory.And while useful runs lower down the order are always praised on the day, they tend to be swiftly forgotten if they haven’t proved match-changing. Here, however, Rizwan found a way of truly making a difference to the complexion of a contest that had Pakistan sitting much prettier when he had reached three-figures than when he walked out of the changing room. And even if it might have been tongue-in-cheek, the extent to which Test match hundreds separate true batsmen from useful lower-order contributors was made plain by Yasir Shah’s banter with his keeper.”This was a difficult hundred for me. Yasir Shah was joking around with me, saying “I won’t consider you a batsman until you score a hundred. Even I can score fifties!””It is worth remembering, amidst all the eulogies, that the final chapter of this Test hasn’t yet been written, even if Rizwan expressed repeated confidence that Pakistan were still well on top in Rawalpindi. With South Africa having laid a solid foundation for the chase – they ended the day at 127 for 1 – on an increasingly flattening pitch, they may feel they can take inspiration from West Indies’ stunning chase in Chattogram and make it two glorious away wins in two days. Not if Rizwan has anything to do with it, though.”This is a Test match, and partnerships happen in Test matches. Just because they have a good partnership doesn’t mean we need to panic. They have good batsmen and that can happen. But we have good bowlers, and when that partnership finally breaks we’re confident of staying on top of them.”Thankfully we managed to dig ourselves out of that situation and I was able to score a hundred. The pitch has definitely improved but it can still take spin. I think we attacked a bit too much at the start, but they were able to get away from us. But that can happen in a phase of the game, and we’re comfortable that we’ll rein them back in tomorrow.”Rizwan isn’t a man generally associated with easy confidence, but the fairytale relationship he currently enjoys with Test cricket would make anyone feel ten feet tall. Day five might end up being a famous for Test match cricket in Rawalpindi, but as far as Pakistan’s premier No. 6 batsman is concerned, whatever happens tomorrow is unlikely to top today.

One of the early ones? One dominated by Mumbai? Or a Dhoni special? Our staffers watch the footage and get to arguing

13-Apr-2021Matt Roller, assistant editor: Well, regardless which season was our favourite of the first 13, I’m sure 2021 is going to be the best yet. []Sreshth Shah, sub-editor: Before we get to the contenders, can we all just agree that 2011 was the worst? Ten teams in two groups of five, accompanied by complex match-ups where some teams faced each other only once? (Yes, Deiva, I know CSK won).Roller: 2011 had the highest Kochi Tuskers Kerala coefficient, which means it was the best. I mean, you guys remember those kits, right?Shah: Orange and purple, to symbolise their desire to have the orange-cap and purple-cap holders! Still gives me nightmares.Deivarayan Muthu, sub-editor: Hahaha, back-to-back titles for CSK, but that final was so very one-sided. And, for me, some of these early seasons were bit hit-and-giggle.Roller: To be fair, RCB signing Chris Gayle as a replacement for Dirk Nannes (like for like) was an all-time great off-field move. Orange cap and MVP, and the move that turned him into an IPL legend. But yeah – that format was horrible.Shah: Honestly, Deiva, the hit-and-giggle may have attracted me the most! Most teams were still firming their strategies up. I’m pretty sure the Rajasthan Royals had the worst odds to win IPL 2008, having spent the least money at the auction. And the league still had Pakistani players – Shahid Afridi, Shoaib Akhtar among others.Related

Is it possible to enjoy the County Championship and the IPL together? They're so similar, no?

The greatest IPL performances, No. 9: Corey Anderson's 95 not out

Which is the most popular IPL team?

How to watch a T20 game

The revolution Kieron Pollard led

Muthu: Absolutely. The Pakistan flavour in the IPL was something else. What a remarkable debut that was from Shoaib Akhtar at the Eden Gardens – the same venue where he had yorked Tendulkar and Dravid. Shoaib took down Gambhir and Sehwag, then bounced out AB de Villiers with what took off like a NASA rocket. He was touching 150kph and the ground was jiving and grooving to all of that. Sohail Tanvir: purple-cap holder in the first season. Great fun. Anyway, I know this will make me feel me old, but how old were you then, Matt?Roller: Was our combined age less than Imran Tahir’s actual age now? I was ten! [in 2008]Muthu: I was six years older than you. I suck at math, but definitely less than Tahir.Shah: And I was at the ground as a 15-year old doing DX-type celebrations. Never mind…Roller: Shah + Muthu + Roller in IPL 1 = 41; Tahir in IPL 14 = 42. Nice.Muthu: Hahaha, sorry to veer away, but Shawn Michaels was the best among the DX crowd.Shah: So let’s start from the top, shall we? I thought 2008 was excellent, only because we didn’t know what to expect and the proper underdogs went on to clinch the whole thing. Shane Warne leading his troops to battle. The emergence of Yusuf Pathan.But 2009, in South Africa, was even better. Imagine: the teams that finished seventh and eighth in 2008 reached the final the following season! That really cemented the IPL as a league where “anything could happen”. And of course, the old wardog Anil Kumble playing a crucial role in the final. Proving that T20 cricket wasn’t just for the newbies.Roller: 2008 and 2009 were really fun from the “cricketainment” side, but that often made things feel a bit gimmicky, rather than a fully fledged league.Personally, I think the early season that is worth considering is 2010. Third season, teams had developed their identities to a certain extent and were getting smarter about strategy, and you had global T20 specialists like Kieron Pollard beginning to get picked up for huge money after doing so well in the Champion League T20. And the SRT narrative arc: orange cap and MVP, but a match-losing innings in the final.Sizzling in South Africa: Adam Gilchrist made a 35-ball 85 to take the Deccan Chargers into the 2009 IPL final•Themba Hadebe/Associated PressShah: Don’t forget table-toppers Delhi Daredevils finishing with ten wins out of 14 in the league stage in 2009, only to get knocked out by an Adam Gilchrist masterclass in the semi. That was one of the last of the “knockout-style semis”.Muthu: That’s certainly missing in the IPL these days.Shah: Matt, 2010 should be in consideration only because of the list of players who put up match-winning performances: Nannes, Dmitri Mascarenhas, Justin Kemp – remembering him taking 3 for 12 against Kolkata for CSK – and Juan “Rusty” Theron!I’d still place 2009 above 2008 and 2010 among the first three seasons.Roller: I don’t think the early ones come close to anything that’s happened in the past five editions. If you can ignore the nostalgia, then it feels pretty clear to me that the standard has shot up, T20 has evolved in plain sight, and each of the last five seasons has been brilliant in terms of the race for the playoffs in particular – all of them going down to the final day of the group stage, I think?Shah: Thanks for bursting the (sorry to drop that all-important word these days) bubble, Matt, and bringing us all back to reality.Muthu: Yeah, I’d agree with Matt that the first couple of seasons were more about “cricketainment”. In the 2010 season, there was a bit of strategy, and it marked the arrival of Pollard. It was also one where spinners started to bowl more often in the powerplay. Ramesh Powar for Kings XI Punjab. Andrew Symonds used to take the new ball against the lefties. R Ashwin and Muttiah Muralitharan were CSK’s powerplay spinners. The best strategic move that season has to be MS Dhoni stationing Matthew Hayden at the edge of the circle at short, straight mid-off and then placing a long-off right behind him, challenging Pollard to hit over both men, but Pollard eventually holed out to Haydos!High-speed chase: Corey Anderson’s unbeaten 95 allowed the Mumbai Indians to get a jaw-dropping 190 in 14.3 overs to qualify for the 2014 playoffs•BCCIRoller: We should acknowledge there’s a big personal aspect to all this too, by the way. I’ll always look back at 2020 particularly fondly because it took place while the UK was heading back into lockdown – it was such good escapism to be able to watch that from mid-afternoon every day for two months while the days were getting shorter and the pubs and restaurants were starting to close again.Muthu: There’s maybe some recency attached to 2020, but it was quite thrilling, delivering one Super Over after another, including a double Super Over. Three teams at 12 points, three teams at 14. Sunrisers Hyderabad qualified with a mere 12 points in 2019, I think. KKR could have qualified in 2020 had they not lost heavily to RCB. Sure, it was CSK’s worst season, but if Dwayne Bravo had limped and rolled out one cutter after another to Axar Patel, even they could have snuck in. Instead, Ravindra Jadeja tossed it into the swinging arc of Axar. There was a gulf between Mumbai and the rest, but If you look at just the other teams, it was pretty close.Shah: Matt, I agree with you too. But just before we go into the last few seasons, the 2014 and 2015 editions deserve shoutouts too. Kolkata won 2014 on the back of nine straight victories – including doing the double over Mumbai in the league phase. And the last game of the league phase in 2014 had Mumbai Indians chasing 190 in 14.3 overs thanks to Corey Anderson (and Aditya Tare’s last-ball six), which left Rahul Dravid throwing his cap on the floor.And in 2015, Mumbai Indians were struggling after the first half of the season. Then they pulled out seven wins in their last eight league games to not only enter the top four but a streak of five wins took them to the top two. It was the first season where they really outmuscled their opponents – the start of an era that’s still running. Both 2014 and 2015 story arcs made for fascinating seasons.Roller: 2014 had the best final, I reckon? Wriddhiman Saha 115 not out off 55 and ends up on the losing side.Encore: after beating the Pune Supergiant by a run in the 2017 final, Mumbai Indians won by the same margin in 2019, against the Chennai Super Kings•Mahesh Kumar A/Associated PressShah: It was the best up until the two one-run wins – Mumbai vs Pune, 2017 and CSK vs Mumbai, 2019.Roller: The UAE leg of 2014 made it quite fun too, in the effect it had on teams’ strategies and the fact that we got to see some pure, uncut #MaxwellBall for a few weeks.Muthu: Pujara and Maxi FTW. I’d put the 2010 final up there too – it was the beginning of the IPL’s fiercest rivalry.Roller: Oh, and nobody thinks 2013 was the best season, right? But it’s worth mentioning that it did have the most iconic IPL innings of all time: Chris Gayle 175 not out.I reckon 2016 is a genuine contender here – the Virat-AB year.Shah: Of course. Sunrisers needing to win all three playoff games, having not finished in the top two. Kohli magic.Roller: And also the season where Gujarat Lions turned up and were unbelievable! Easy to forget they were top of the points table.Shah: It was the only time since the inception of the playoffs that a team outside the top two won.Roller: Those Kohli-AB stands at Chinnaswamy were something else – against the Gujarat Lions and Sunrisers particularly, but they were just next-level good throughout the season. And then for SRH, the unfashionable team playing unfashionable cricket to do the job in the playoffsDouble the appetite: Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers’ together ransacked 939 runs for the Royal Challengers Bangalore in the 2016 season•AFPBen Cutting MOTM in the final! And another thriller – 208 v 200… David Warner scoring 50 every other game… what a season. I think that’s got to be a podium finish as a minimum.Muthu: But these were all seasons where the winning franchise got to play at home and maximise it. Which brings me to 2018. It started with everyone trolling CSK as Dad’s Army. It ended up with Dhoni trolling everyone in typical Dhoni style. The played just one game at Chepauk due to political turmoil and showed that they could win away. Lungi Ngidi was yanked off the bench in Pune and became the enforcer. There was some Dhoni chaos theory, where he inverted his batting order, in Pune. He showed he still had it. There were games where Harbhajan Singh and Karn Sharma didn’t bowl a single over. Dhoni is often criticised for being rigid, but this was one season where we went against the grain and absorbed all the pressure on comeback.Shah: An overseas player, Mustafizur Rahman, winning the Emerging Player award. Bhuvneshwar Kumar’s consistency. It was perhaps the first season that showed you need your bowling smarts to actually win T20 games consistently.Muthu: It was also Rishabh Pant’s coming-of-age season in the IPL. I think he smashed Bhuvi for 40-something off ten-something balls. Rashid was a phenom that season – his all-round brilliance vs KKR in the knockout was stunning.Roller: Agree that 2018 was a really good one – Pant winning emerging player and coming through with some outrageous innings, the Chris Lynn-Sunil Narine combo flourishing, KL Rahul having a great season back when he used to play with intent…Shah: Throw in Narine’s emergence as a pinch-hitter.Muthu: Oh yeah, Narine at the top was peak T20, one of the revelations of the 2018 season.Roller: But equally, the overriding memory is slower-ball specialists doing really well – AJ Tye purple cap! – and I’m not convinced that always makes for the most enjoyable spectacle.Rishabh Pant vs the Sunrisers in 2018•ESPNcricinfo LtdShah: Okay, 2018 has my vote for the best season, pipping 2016 by a whisker. Now to see if 2020 has enough oomph to beat 2018.Muthu: I never expected AJ Tye to hit close to 150kph. Didn’t he bowl the fastest ball this Big Bash, Matt?Roller: Yeah, he has completely reinvented himself, to be fair. But there were a few other guys that season too, Siddharth Kaul for example, bowling knuckleballs and taking 20-plus wickets.Quick one for 2019: the Andre Russell season. I guess a few players leaving early maybe took the sheen off 2019. And there was the constant feeling that it was the warm-up act for the World Cup immediately after. That said, Dre Russ was out of this world – and the final was one of the best, as we’ve mentioned.Muthu: Yeah, Dre’s hitting was unbelievable that year. And that final was the most tactical final in the IPL. Mumbai made CSK dig deep and made Dhoni think like Mumbai do. Then Lasith Malinga, the greatest T20 bowler in the world (that’s a debate for another day), did what he does.Roller: But the real winner for me personally is 2020. My pitch: Everyone needed that season to happen. Expectations were probably a bit lower with the fact that every game was at a neutral venue, there was chaos in the build-up with various positive Covid tests, and uncertainty as to whether the tournament would even happen. But there were so many close games and multiple Super Overs. The most intricate and advanced tactical side of the IPL won, yet there was so little gap between the teams – there was almost nothing between the other seven. Throw in the context of lockdown over here and it’s a clear winner for me.Muthu: But 2020 and 2018 finals turned out to be one-sided affairs, but otherwise the quality of cricket…the playoff line-up being decided on the last day, big-ticket players lighting up the league. To stage the IPL itself during a pandemic was a massive achievement. Agree, it was hotly contested. For me, it’s a tie between 2018 and 2020, with a Super-Over shootout. Or we don’t need one. We know 2021 is gonna be even better.Roller: Back to this for the pay-off line :)Muthu: Are we done?Roller: Think so?Shah: 2020 was amazing, considering the constraints teams were facing. Covid, neutral venues, hot playing conditions. Add the end of Chennai Super Kings’ dominance (sorry, CSK fans), Kings XI Punjab losing games they shouldn’t have (against DC, Kolkata). Then the late Kings XI rally. Rahul Tewatia magic, T Natarajan emergence. Amid the terrible year that 2020 was, maybe the IPL saved the year’s face for cricket?

Yadav arrived like the culmination of India’s first great pace bloom, but you’re not quite sure what to make of him now

Osman Samiuddin03-Sep-2021In November this year, it’ll be a decade since Umesh Yadav made his Test debut. R Ashwin and Ishant Sharma were part of that attack, so there’s a bit of familiarity and continuity there. But in the milieu in which Yadav operates, of Indian fast bowling, it’s two different worlds.At that time, Yadav arrived like the culmination of India’s first great pace bloom, those years of Ashish Nehra, Irfan Pathan, RP Singh, Sreesanth and, of course, Zaheer Khan. In those early dispatches, Yadav was giddily described, and feted, as the quickest bowler in the country, which itself was revealing. Because the fast-bowling tradition had been thin, an out-and-out quick was a bright, shiny new thing to show off. Plus, he had a very subcontinent (well, okay, Pakistani) fast-bowling backstory: small town, tough early life, tennis-ball cricket, then big time, then a back injury, but then big time again.Related

Umesh Yadav: 'I need to prove to myself that I still have the ability'

'Difficult to keep yourself positive' if you're sitting out – Umesh Yadav

Indian pace bowling is a more robust, populated place these days. Had Mohammed Siraj emerged at the start of the century there’s a good chance he would’ve made his Test debut well before he’d played his 38th first-class game. Yadav has straddled these eras; an important part of this one too, if not quite as central anymore yet, still, on days like today, a little like a remnant of that time.’Days like today’ probably doesn’t need much expanding. It was a messy one for India. Without their best, busiest batter, and despite being five down within the first hour, England scored at over 3.5 per over through the day. Too many boundaries conceded, too many extras, the attack feeling that little bit thin and stretched.That Yadav ended up as their most successful bowler, that he looked at some points their joint-best bowler, and at others the joint-leakiest in some ways only reinforces an early impression that has never quite been shed. In those MS Dhoni years, Yadav, unfairly, became the face of the wider malaise of India’s bowling abroad, a factor in their failure to compete.It was unfair because he wasn’t, in numbers, that bad. He was unfortunate in that his first seven away Tests were all in Australia, an especially intimidating and difficult place for young fast bowlers. He was young and around him the attacks were poor.It’s unfair to bring it up now as well because it’s not as if he plays away from home. This was just his fourth Test outside of India since the start of 2019, and India’s 13th in that time. More remarkably, though India have toured England thrice from 2014 and for five-Test series each time, this is only Yadav’s second Test in the country. (And the very point is that India still dismissed England for under 300, so nowhere near as bad a day as they used to have.)All of this is fairly well-known. Yadav a home specialist, but that’s a weird status for a fast bowler. Spinners are often seen that way. England have started thinking of Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad in that way but only this late into their careers. Generally, the rule with fast bowlers though is that if they’re thought to be good enough, they play in most places. India compete abroad now and he’s not always part of that. Ten years in, it could look like a failure to evolve but the truth is – as he’s acknowledged – that if you don’t get to play in the first place, evolution doesn’t happen easy.And so you have Yadav as we saw Yadav in this innings. Spectacular moments, in those deliveries to dismiss Joe Root and then Dawid Malan, deliveries at the stumps and eking out movement at healthy pace, underpinning a morning burst that put India on top. In those first spells of the innings Yadav was , matching Jasprit Bumrah for intensity: 61 out of the 66 balls he delivered were either in the channel or at the stumps (the same, coincidentally, as Bumrah).But when he returned, a little before lunch, ostensibly to restore the order that Shardul Thakur and Siraj had let go, he conceded two boundaries in his first over and another in the next. He’d been hit for just four boundaries in his first 11 overs; he conceded eight in his last eight. If he was a 23-year-old tearaway on his first tour, you’d still be salivating at the prospect of seeing more of that magic and less of the rest. Instead, he’s 33 and if this was only his second Test in England – only four Indian fast bowlers have played more than his 49 Tests – you’re not quite sure what to make of it.That boundary tally is useful though, in that a cursory, eye-test assessment of Yadav has long been that because he attacks the way he does – full, at the stumps – there’s always one loose ball an over a batter can cash in on. Today, the pitch eased, and the ball got older, and the change bowlers let it slip, but a little management in those later Yadav spells was not unfair to expect.Since Yadav’s debut, an Indian fast bowler has conceded at least four runs per over in an innings (with a minimum cut-off of 10 overs) on 55 occasions. Yadav has been that bowler 17 times, 13 outside of India. In his defence, he’s only conceded at that rate in four innings since 2016, a period in which he has grown as a bowler but one in which he has also played fewer Tests abroad.And this, that of the 25 bowlers who have taken 150+ Test wickets since Yadav’s debut, only six bowlers have a better strike rate than him, but only one has a worse economy rate.This might be the thing about Yadav though, and him being a bit of both these eras and not fully of one. Back when he debuted, if you’d said he will end up with 50 Tests and 150 Test wickets, you’d probably have taken it. Only Kapil Dev, Javagal Srinath and Zaheer would have taken more wickets then. But you look now – with the growth of Ishant in the latter third of his career, the arrival of Mohammed Shami, the futures that Bumrah and Siraj have – and you wonder whether Yadav has done well to end wherever he does, or whether we should – and still may – expect more.

The Singapore batter has created quite a splash at the PSL after being picked up by the Lahore Qalandars

Umar Farooq13-Jun-2021Why are we talking about him?
When 25-year-old David was picked up by the Qalandars in the mini replacement draft ahead of the resumption of PSL 2021 in place of David Wiese, it must have caught at least some people by surprise. But 23* off 15 balls and 64* off 36 balls in his two innings so far are turning heads. Turn to his numbers, and it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise: 558 runs in 14 T20I innings at an average of 46.50 and strike rate of 158.52, and 1033 runs in 39 T20 innings at 38.25 (average) and 155.33 (strike rate). The Qalandars had clearly done their research.Is he from Australia or from Singapore?
He was born in Singapore in 1996 – his family had been living there from the 1990s after Tim’s father Rod David, an engineer by profession, moved to the country from Australia. Rod went on to play cricket for Singapore in 1997. Tim was two when his family moved back to Perth, and his childhood was spent mainly in Australia. He grew up watching his father playing for the Claremont-Nedlands Cricket Club, and followed in his footsteps.

“He [David] doesn’t have a great career but he is young and looked ambitious. We saw his Big Bash videos and made up our mind. Normally we tap our contacts around the world asking about players before picking them, but in Tim’s case, we went with our instincts.”Sameer Rana, Lahore Qalandars team manager

Tim started playing seriously when he was eight, and at 19, he played in the Northeast Premier League in England, amassing 963 runs at 53.50 to become the leading run-getter for the year (2015). The same year, he played on the Under-19 circuit in Australia for Western Australia, but didn’t get much success; it was better when he got to the Under-23s in 2018, as he scored 411 runs in five matches at 45.66, which earned him a ticket to the BBL with the Perth Scorchers.But his stint was cut short after he picked up a stress fracture in his foot. He returned to playing for Claremont-Nedlands in March 2019, within three months of suffering the injury, and then needed an operation in April 2019 before returning to the field.When did he return to Singapore?
David was always eligible to play for Singapore, as the country of his birth. And then a combination of factors convinced him to return.As he explained to ESPNcricinfo, after playing for the Scorchers in 2018 and then having a rookie contract for 2018-19 with Western Australia, David did try to continue playing in Australia. But after Western Australia delisted him in April 2019 and then the Scorchers didn’t offer him a contract, David returned to Singapore.His international career began soon after, with the T20 World Cup qualifiers in 2019.As such, David had never played cricket in Singapore, having left the country with his family when still a child. The connection with the country had remained, though, as the Davids travelled to Singapore more than once for their holidays.”Of course, I have the ambition to play for Australia… but, at the moment, I am happy playing for Singapore”•Lahore QalandarsAny chance of a return to Australia as a cricketer?
This season at the BBL, David scored 279 runs at a strike rate of 153.29 in 14 innings for the Hobart Hurricanes. And that might yet open some doors for him.”Of course, I have the ambition to play for Australia,” David told ESPNcricinfo. “If that opportunity comes up, then I would love to take that. But, at the moment, I am happy playing for Singapore. There are some very important tournaments coming up and it’s been an important part of my development so far, and I am looking forward to being a part of it going forward.”At the moment, most of my opportunities are in Twenty20, and I am enjoying myself and having a great time here – the PSL is my first overseas franchise opportunity, but I am open to everything and if stuff like that comes up, then I would love to have a crack at it.”How did the Lahore Qalandars move happen?
The target was a hard-hitting middle-order batter who was good against spin, and would be available for the Abu Dhabi leg of PSL 2021. The two shortlisted candidates were Jack Wildermuth and David. David’s game against spin impressed the Qalandars’ team management enough for the deal to be struck.David actually has a higher strike rate (163.82) against spin than against pace (149.08).”In franchise cricket, there is a big temptation to pick a bigger name and over the years we learned to resist,” Sameer Rana, the Qalandars team manager, told ESPNcricinfo. “We wanted to have a player who can provide a balance in our line-up. It wasn’t about just picking up a player and figuring out later how to adjust. We didn’t want to gamble and wanted to make sure we get the right player.”He [David] doesn’t have a great career but he is young and looked ambitious. We saw his Big Bash videos and made up our mind. Normally we tap our contacts around the world asking about players before picking them, but in Tim’s case, we went with our instincts.”