Every mission needs a man with a determined mindset to change the prevailing norm and do things their own way. An individual force of nature that enacts change by their own way so as to speak. But being merely a harbinger of novelty isn't a sign of quality... you need to be good enough to both bring about the change and be pointed to as the new icon in town. Besides, our recruits have all been remarkable and this one shall be no exception.
Meet
Waqar Younis Maitla, arguably the
most talented pace bowler ever seen in the last fifty years at his peak. When Waqar was first developing, the rage all around fast bowling in world cricket was who could bowl the meanest and nastiest bouncer to intimidate the batters and draw them into false shots. Any injuries inflicted, accidental or not were just bonuses. The full length ball did exist and was used to great success especially by the Big Bird and early proponents of reverse swing like Nawaz and Imran but nobody had made their modus operandi in test cricket be the fearsome quick yorker and full length ball aimed at the stumps consistently. Waqar did not care for the bouncer tactics of the 80s and instead went straight for the kill (or wicket, in this case) by making full use of his incredible late inswingers to get batters dancing in an entirely different but equally embarrassing manner. The toecrushing yorker was his magnum opus; his finest gift to the cricket world. And if you weren't dimissed by his early swing, he could back to haunt you when the ball was slightly older and reversing all over the place. This relentless pursuit of wickets made him the most feared strike bowler in test history until a certain South African came along but it also made him vulnerable to leaking runs or throwing away momentum. These are however the type of nitpicks that barely make a dent in the records of some of the best out there. If you do want to make a nitpick, he was a
terrible off-spin bowler when he did try that out but hey I'm not gonna complain since this is what makes him eligible for my side, we'll most likely never use that particular 'talent' of his.
Waqar's entire career can be summarised by two phases, a first phase where he was the greatest pacer to be bowling in test cricket of his time and perhaps even the greatest ever with a sub-20 average whilst picking up over half of his test wickets to go with nineteen of his twenty-two five wicket hauls. There wasn't a country he hadn't tormented and he ended up picking at least a four wicket haul against each of his opponents. The second, less glamorous phase had him average twenty-eight and pick up the rest of his wickets whilst being slightly more expensive than in the first and with only three five wicket hauls. There were still moments of genius like at Gqeberha where he picked up his last ten wicket haul in a test but it was a pale imitation of his raging first half of career. This was a half equivalent to the likes of Ntini, Srinath, Gough and Caddick back then, handy enough but not quite as legendary as the first half was. Still, that first half of his career was so good that he gets included in every Pakistani XI ever made without restriction and plenty of people have no qualms picking him in their World XI for the sheer hope that he brings the same level of fearsome destruction.
With a generational talent like Waqar that can end games on their own, the best thing you can do is sit back and let them run the show with encouragment and backing like his skipper did. That's what we'll seek to do and we'll let Waqar dish out his favourite yorkers and reverse swing deliveries at will.
Viv Richards
Kumar Sangakkara
Garry Sobers
Keith Miller
Ian Botham
Waqar Younis
