Hard to add anything constructive considering it was a Twenty20 match & it was his first game. He produced some good deliveries on a challenging spot & passed the edge on a few occasions. Break it down. Only conceded 2 boundaries in 12 deliveries from a batsmen who took most of the bowlers to the cleaners. 3 runs only from the other 9 balls. Decent & respectable start to hopefully a long and prosperous career. The action was smooth. Pace was pretty good.
Tipping him to take 5 or 6 wickets in the 5 match ODI series which commences tomorrow. We will get a better indication of his promising potential then but for now a steady start indeed.
But why he was given only two overs?
ReplyDeleteAfridi over bowled himself when he was struggling. He was sleeping and failing to find his length on a slow track where the ball sat up nicely. He kind of miscalculated. Junaid should have got at least 1 more in his first spell. Afridi enforced an unnecessary change of Saeed Ajmal within the batting power play and the over went for 11 runs & helped Simmons and Bravo gained the momentum for a big partnership which followed. There is a new ball dilemma as to who will and should open the bowling with JK. I would go with Hafeez as Rehman should be replaced by Hammad Azam as a 3rd seam option and extra batsmen. Afridi should bat at number 8. If Rehman is in the 11 he should open up with JK. Shehzad needs to fire BUT he might already be dropped. Hammad has to play somehow.
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