The Real Pathan! ISO Certified!

[pensionplan]

Pathan, Nehra and Munaf are fools gold. They will dangle the carrot right up until when it counts when they bail and are nowhere to be seen.

ok. I Know you now.

[Roshanrocks]

Yusuf Pathan finds a way past the bouncer Years from now, when people think of Yusuf Pathan's maiden one-day century, they are unlikely to remember much more than the sheer brutality of it all. Yet, there was so much more to the innings than the clinical straight-hitting, which admittedly was in a league of its own. A batsman's response when his weaknesses are targeted can say a lot about his state of mind. While Yusuf dismantled New Zealand when they served him freebies in his hitting areas, the clarity he showed when tested with the short ball was even more telling. Dead rubber or not, there was lot riding on this for Yusuf when he came out to join Rohit Sharma in what was panning into a veritable shoot-out between the two to stay in the hunt for a full-time middle-order opening. India required 208 off 183 when Yusuf took guard - not the situation cut out for a batsman termed a fifth-gear slogger who cannot handle the bouncer. It is a reputation that has tagged Yusuf for long now. After losing favour following the tri-series in Zimbabwe, he returned to domestic cricket and did what came naturally to him - he flayed India's local attacks in all formats. The manner in which he scored his runs - 195 off 138 balls in a Ranji game, 89 off 42 to lift a derailed Twenty20 chase, and a 63 off 30 in the Challenger Trophy - did not help his cause as much as reinforce the tag of flat-track bully. Had he been plonking his front foot forward and tucking into over-pitched deliveries, or had he found a way past the short stuff? He got his chance to address that question today. It helped Yusuf that he checked in against spin, before facing the trial by bounce. Daniel Vettori tried trapping him with arm-balls, getting the odd delivery to skid in with the late-evening dew. Nathan McCullum was flighting his offbreaks, asking to be lofted over a vacant long-on. With India still well off the greens, Yusuf resisted the bait. He began with measured dabs on either side of the wicket, picking Vettori's variations from the pitch and reaching out to deal with McCullum. By the 25th over, he had moved to a quiet 8 off 13 balls, before Vettori brought back the seamers. Andy McKay, New Zealand's fastest bowler, came on and square-leg was pushed back to the boundary. McKay's third ball to Yusuf was a slow bouncer, which he spotted early but chose to let go. Two balls later it came again. McKay's left-arm, around-the-wicket angle, at around 140 kph, makes the bouncer a tough delivery for any right-hand batsman. Six months ago, Yusuf would have pressed forward, looking for the driving length, before arresting his momentum and getting into a tangled attempt at a pull without transferring the weight back. No such confusion this time: he stayed put on a more balanced and crouched stance at the crease, and ducked under it with intent. McKay tried it again in the 30th over, and having warmed up to the chase by now with a flat six off Vettori, Yusuf took the challenge. He was however beaten by the pace and failed to make contact with the pull. Yusuf's reaction gave nothing away - no self-admonishing, no air-practice to perfect the shot - he just stood his ground and looked down the track as McKay's follow-through ended closer to the batting crease than normal. The next ball was pitched up, the surprise delivery to catch the batsman waiting on the backfoot for another bumper, but Yusuf knew the two-card trick was being played, and lofted it cleanly over mid-off. Rohit departed, the rains came down and broke play for an hour with India needing 113 from 14 overs. While Saurabh Tiwary fidgeted around with nervous energy, one could sense calmness in the way Yusuf faced up to a few throwdowns before play resumed. Vettori's first ball on resumption was launched over long-on, bringing up Yusuf's half-century. In the 39th over, he asked for the batting Powerplay, and flexed his muscles by depositing the fifth ball of Kyle Mills' over, over the roof behind wide long-on. Tim Southee tested him with fuller lengths and three quiet overs ensued, as Yusuf played out incisive yorker after yorker without panicking. In the 43rd over, he made up for lost time, swinging Mills' shoddy lengths for 21 runs through the leg-side. India moved ahead of the D/L par-score, and from there it was a canter to victory, despite Tiwary's scratchiness at the other end. Fittingly enough, the century came off a McKay bouncer that was dispatched over wide long-on. It angled in sharply from wide of off stump, and Yusuf moved back and across, without lunging forward as he once used to. The crack of the ball pinging the meat of the swinging blade gave way to warm applause from a crowd that had earned its treat for having waited through the rains. Yusuf threw his arms up and soaked in the moment. It is a shot that will be replayed several times in India in days to come. It is the shot of a man who had stared his biggest challenge in the face and found a way to deal with it. Nitin Sundar is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo

[spectre]

Why is SA treated like some kind of heaven here Sure, he might fail in SA, but thats not important, the entire WC is going to be played in subcontinent and it will all be mostly flat decks His destructive hitting will be very handy. He is a must for the WC After the WC, these guys can well fight it out for a place in the XI

[Hindustani]

Pathan will **** his pants in SA. :hysterical: Do you guys really think the saffers will bowl full easy half volleys for Yusuf to have a golf swing at? Bowl two short balls and he will caught hooking or pulling. With the pace and bounce the SA pitches will provide, Jaddu is a much better candidate who can at least muster some runs regardless of the the pitch conditions. The only players other then the studs I would want to see in the final XI are Kohli, Tiwary, Jadeja and Rohit.

Man, you were making some sense before mentioning jaddu :(

[vaibhav_delhi]

Pathan may have booked his place in WC squad with this knock, rightly so. I want to see more from him though. He was averaging >20 before this series. I wouldnt pick him if the WC wasnt in the subcont

[mhr123]

The curious case of Ravindra Jadeja http://www.cricbuzz.com/cricket-news/33557/The-curious-case-of-Ravindra-Jadeja

If you've watched the ongoing India-New Zealand series on television, chances are, you've seen people in hideous t-shirts and hideous wigs dancing in hideous synchronization whenever the camera focusses on them (which it does every few minutes). Ostensibly there to promote the sponsor, these images have threatened to do the impossible: knock Ravindra Jadeja off his perch as the most reviled thing in Indian cricket. Fans disagree on whether Sehwag wins more matches for India than Tendulkar, they split hairs over whether Dravid and Kumble get the accolades they deserve, they polarize themsleves when the words 'Sourav Ganguly' are uttered, but in the matter of Ravindra Jadeja, there seems to be a uniform - and slightly overwhelming - unanimity. It can be summarized as taking the form of an opinion that goes: If Ravindra Jadeja has to be on a cricket field, let him be on one that humanity will construct on Mars, and if he has to be on one on the earth, let it be somewhere in the Arctic circle. After Yusuf Pathan's heroics in the fourth ODI against New Zealand, it is now unlikely that Jadeja will even make it to the final twelve of a full-strength Indian team. And yet the antipathy towards him is not likely to fade. The question is, does Jadeja deserve it? He has so far played in 35 ODIs for India, scoring runs at an average of 31.5 and a strike rate of almost 77. Not outstanding, but not terrible either. Digging deeper into the stats though, two of his innings have been against the weak Zimbabwe attack, and he has hit fifties in both (He has played against Bangladesh but not batted against them). Taking those out of the equation, his average falls to 26.4 and his strike rate to 75.3. Even though 26.4 is not a very flattering number, it is important to bear in mind that Jadeja comes into the team based on his utility-value - i.e. he can bowl as well as bat. It makes sense therefore, to look at his bowling figures. In his career, he has 29 wickets in ODIs at an average touching 43 and an economy rate of 4.9. Once again though, his stats are bolstered by good returns against Zimbabbwe. He also has bowled against Bangladesh, and while they can claim not to be as weak as Zimbabwe after their 4-0 mauling of New Zealand, they aren't yet close to consistently being in the same league as the top sides. Taking his performances against these two sides out of the equation, his stats read: 24 wickets at an average of 44.7 and an economy rate of 4.97. Hang on to those stats for a moment and let's examine Jadeja's role in the team if he is part of the playing eleven. The top six Indian batsmen in ODIs are without doubt: Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina and Yuvraj Singh. Add Dhoni into the mix and whether all seven play or six, the batting line-up looks power packed. If all seven play, the remaining four slots have to go to men who can command a place in the side on the strength of their bowling alone. In that scenario, there is no room for any bits-and-pieces player. The only time Jadeja would come into the reckoning is if he plays at Number 7 and one of the batsmen is dropped from the eleven. Further, since Number 7 is not likely to be needed in too many rescue or rebuild the innings (again given the strength of the top six), the man at that position should ideally be someone who can hit quick runs. In addition, he should be able to bowl and chip in with useful overs and possibly a wicket or two. Of the 22 times that Ravindra Jadeja has batted, his strike-rate has crossed 100 (ie he has scored at a run-a-ball or better) only 7 times, which is less than a third of his innings. His bowling record though, is better and an economy rate of less than 5 on matches played mostly in the sub-continent is a creditable one to have. Of the possible competitiors for the Number 7 slot (in the event that India go in with only five batsmen and Dhoni), the foremost would be: Yusuf Pathan, Saurabh Tiwary, R Ashwin, Rohit Sharma and Ravindra Jadeja. Yes, it's true that for the foreseeable future, Yusuf Pathan's showing has ensured that the other four are not so much 'competition' and more in the nature of 'making up the numbers' but even for the purpose of considering second and third options for the squad, it is worth considering the claims of the other men. Saurabh Tiwary doesn't bowl, and that puts him at a serious disadvantage, while Rohit Sharma has an average and strike-rate that are lower than Jadeja and as a bowler, bowls a lot less and a lot worse than Jadeja. The claims of Tiwary and Rohit are weak in this light. In Ashwin though, there is a man who might not have bowled as many international overs as Jadeja, but who has much better pedigree. As for batting, Ashwin has not impressed much in the international arena, but has a batting average of 35.3 in first class cricket. The clear winner is, of course Yusuf Pathan. This match saw him bludgeon a century and pick up 3 wickets, and after appropriate pruning for weaker opposition, his stats read: an average of 29.5 at a strike rate of 111.6 while batting and 25 wickets at 34.4 at an economy rate of 5.9 while bowling. That makes for a very favourable comparison with Ravindra Jadeja's stats, with only Yusuf's economy rate being higher, but his vastly superior batting strike-rate and bowling average more than compensating for the higher economy rate. However, it is only Yusuf who clearly towers over Jadeja numbers-wise. Ashwin and Tiwary have played too few matches, while Rohit has been numerically a worse batsman and a worse bowler than Jadeja. While for potential alone, Ashwin definitely deserves a spot in an Indian World Cup squad ahead of Jadeja, Rohit Sharma most certainly does not. Even if he were ranked above Rohit and Tiwary in the pecking order though, Jadeja probably does not deserve a spot in the World Cup squad. He is, at best, third in the pecking order for a spot that is not even likely to come into play, since India's first choice will be to go in with six batsmen and Dhoni - especially when a lot of those batsmen can turn their arms over and fill up the fifth bowlers' quota. The vitriol poured on the unfortunate Jadeja though, stems not just from slightly inadequate numbers but from the perception of his contributing to Indian defeats. The defeat that seems to rankle the most is when India lost the 5th ODI of the 7-match series to Australia last year in Hyderabad - a match that was made immortal by Sachin Tendulkar playing amongst his greatest ever innings. That India and Sachin ended up on the losing side, and that Jadeja had been batting well before being senselessly run-out, contributed to the fury against Jadeja. He does not deserve a place in India's World Cup squad, but he does deserve the right to make a stupid error or two. On December 6 2010, Ravindra Jadeja celebrated his 22nd birthday. For a man who is only that young, there is still hope of making a better cricketer out of himself. © Cricbuzz

[Holysmoke]

Sachin Sehwag Gambhir Kohli Raina Dhoni Yuvraj (All-rounder) Bhajji Zaheer Ishant/Nehra/Ashwin Praveen This would be my squad. I'd take Yuvraj over pathan for sure.

[Sachin=GOD]

This innings means much more than just winning the match. This innings has ensured that Jadeja will not be in the playing 11 for the WC' date= probably won't even make it to the squad...It's a great day today!!:yay::yay::yay:

:dito::dito:

Sachin Sehwag Gambhir Kohli Raina Dhoni Yuvraj (All-rounder) Bhajji Zaheer Ishant/Nehra/Ashwin Praveen This would be my squad. I'd take Yuvraj over pathan for sure.

same team and I'd have Yusuf, Dinesh Kartikh, Ashwin and Ishant as the 4 remaining players in the squad.

[vishalvirsingh]

ON Indian Tracks ... i would pencil YUsuf into my eleven in t 20"s, One days for sure ...bcos he is a Match winner and now can also play bouncers..... All the world over people r noticing him like sehwag Attacks are feeling scared of him like they are scared of a sehwag and a sachin, No body worries a lot when a gambhir or a rohit also and even other batsmen ar on the crease but if yusuf is there , the bowlers r not sure what to do .. they only bounce and 30 percent of there bouncers are off target and wides or they end up bolwing full length balls , ysterday kyle mills was bowling at 105 to 115 at one time and simple full length balls.. he was so scared that he lost control over his bowling....mckay was bowling bouncers all over so ended up bowling wides, when a baller fears a batsman he ends up either bowling too fast or looses control over his bowling.. some thing like this happens to many bowlers. i hit 2 sixes and 3 fours and one single against a spinner in one over... i was standing a little ahead of the crease and this bowler was pitching all the balls just ahead of where my bat was and i was taking over pitched balls to hit hard...his later balls were even more simple for me to hit and i had got into a flow of hitting and slogging.. i ws just seeing the ball till it pitched on the ground..bowler if he fears then he is gone. yusuf creates fear...

[fineleg]

All the world over people r noticing him like sehwag Attacks are feeling scared of him like they are scared of a sehwag and a sachin, yusuf creates fear...

Lulz and more lulz :giggle: Pls. lets not even compare Yusuf to Sehwag/SRT. Yusuf cannot even be compared to Raina or Yuvi or Gambhir. Lets leave him for what he is - a slogger who comes good once in a while on Indian pitches, and can bowl a bit, and may make it to the WC squad and lot better than Alien jadoo. Fair enough.

[Hindustani]

Sachin Sehwag Gambhir Kohli Raina Dhoni Yuvraj (All-rounder) Bhajji Zaheer Ishant/Nehra/Ashwin Praveen This would be my squad. I'd take Yuvraj over pathan for sure.

great selection, is this a WC team or for SA ? for WC, I won't go with 3 seamers, so it has to be ashwin or part timers if UV/Raina starts bowling well

[Shane]

Fantastic Innings under pressure, would love to see him higher up the order next game or may be send him to open, make it more fun to watch for the crowd. Unleashing the BEAST in Pathan :D I dont think any other batsman in the world can hit the ball as hard as Yusuf, Its just BRUTE POWER.

[spectre]

Sachin Gambhir Yuvraj Sehwag Raina Dhoni YP Ashwin Praveen Zaheer Munaf

[gaurav92]

A very good innings, but the real Test for him would be good bowling attacks in SAF (if he gets a chance).

[Shane]

A very good innings' date=' but the real Test for him would be good bowling attacks in SAF (if he gets a chance).[/quote'] Dont really care if he fails in South Africa, If he can produce such innings once in every three innings, play him as a sub continental specialist, considering we play more than 50-60% of the games in the subcontinent, he could prove lethal, its Horses for Courses.

[vaibhav_delhi]

Lulz and more lulz :giggle: Pls. lets not even compare Yusuf to Sehwag/SRT. Yusuf cannot even be compared to Raina or Yuvi or Gambhir. Lets leave him for what he is - a slogger who comes good once in a while on Indian pitches, and can bowl a bit, and may make it to the WC squad and lot better than Alien jadoo. Fair enough.

+1 knowledgeable finey :)

[gaurav92]

Dont really care if he fails in South Africa' date=' If he can produce such innings once in every three innings, play him as a sub continental specialist, considering we play more than 50-60% of the games in the subcontinent, he could prove lethal, its Horses for Courses.[/quote'] So you mean he will be a temporary player, getting a look in only in sub-continents and the other guy will have to play on difficult tracks away from home ? It wont be fair on the other player, as he has to forgo an opportunity for scoring some easy runs.Most probably it will be either Nohit, or M Vijay

[saneindian]

So you mean he will be a temporary player' date=' getting a look in only in sub-continents and the other guy will have to play on difficult tracks away from home ? It wont be fair on the other player, as he has to forgo an opportunity for scoring some easy runs.Most probably it will be either Nohit, or M Vijay[/quote'] Horses for courses? Pick your side as per the conditions. if his brother is fit and in form, then they can both swap each others place depending on the conditions.

[gaurav92]

Lulz and more lulz :giggle: Pls. lets not even compare Yusuf to Sehwag/SRT. Yusuf cannot even be compared to Raina or Yuvi or Gambhir. Lets leave him for what he is - a slogger who comes good once in a while on Indian pitches, and can bowl a bit, and may make it to the WC squad and lot better than Alien jadoo. Fair enough.

:woot: Finey giving him the charge there........Yes I agree, he can just be better than Jadeja for the World Cup.But i doubt if he will be a part of the playing XI. Sachin Sehwag Gautam Raina Yuvraj Kohli Dhoni Bhajji PK Nehra Zak No place to accommodate him unless Yuvi keeps failing and he keeps scoring BIG.

[gaurav92]

Horses for courses? Pick your side as per the conditions. if his brother is fit and in form' date=' then they can both swap each others place depending on the conditions.[/quote'] For a start, his brother wont be in the Playing XI in the near future(at least for a couple of years).