17 November 2004	Wednesday	04 Shawwal 1425

Have we found a Saeed Anwar in Salman Butt? It is too early to say because one swallow does not make a summer but if the young batsman can keep his shirt collar buttoned-down and his feet on the ground then at least one slot in the team has been firmed up as an opener. To get selected to play at the highest-level means that the talent is there. It does not necessarily mean there is also the temperament. In raw terms, temperament means the ability not to be awed by the occasion, to shut one's mind to everything else except the task at hand. Salman passed with flying colours.

A crowd of a 100, 000 is an awesome sight but if it is a partisan crowd as the crowd at Eden Gardens was then it takes on the appearance of an intimidating mob. Irfan Pathan bowled one very dangerous opening over to Salman and one could almost hear his nerves jangling. That was all as Salman Butt buckled down, the defiance of youth rather than its exuberance. and played an innings that young batsmen dream about.

Salman was a member of the Pakistan A team that was playing a triangular tournament in Kenya. The selectors pulled him out and picked him for the squad for the ICC Champions Trophy. It was an inspired piece of selection even though he did not seem to inspire the team management and was played sparingly.

I cannot even recall whether he played against Sri Lanka but the selectors kept faith in him and he was included in the squad in the match against India at Kolkata. Fortune smiled on Pakistan and he made the playing eleven ahead of Taufique Omar and Imran Farhat. But the team management got it only half-right, getting the other half horribly wrong by dropping Imran Farhat and getting Younis Khan to open the innings. But for the maturity shown by Shoaib Malik, Pakistan could have lost a lot of early wickets when Younis was out almost immediately.

Younis is a specialist batsman and not an utility player who can also be asked to keep wickets, asking an eye-specialist to take out someone's gall stones. It is being manifestly unfair to him and he could lose his place in the team.

293 was a lot of runs to get and Pakistan got it right by not trying to chase them helter-skelter. Pakistan needed to keep wickets in hand and the asking-rate meant nothing if there was batting to come.

That's what the Salman-Shoaib Malik partnership achieved. It gave Pakistan a platform. Here I must digress and bring in the dew factor. I am amazed that Ganguly did not factor this when he chose to bat. He was a local lad and he should have known the local conditions. When India was piling on the runs, he was getting much praise from the commentators but when the ball got wet and India's spinners were nullified, Ganguly's decision to bat first was criticized.

That's what makes an expert, having the best of both worlds. I am not sure about the rule about changing the ball. I know the white ball can be changed once if it is discoloured. But the ball was changed six times during Pakistan's innings. Surely that can't be right.

But to get back to Pakistan's innings, Inzamam looked scratchy and his timing was poor but to his credit he did not panic and do something foolish. He knew his was the prize wicket. He stuck it out and the timing returned and he played a gem of an innings.

Delighted as we are by the win, there is cause for concern about the bowling. Shahid Afridi and Abdul Razzak did a magnificent job in pulling back India when it seemed to be on a run-riot and also took wickets. But the others were all over the place and proved extremely expensive. Shoaib Akhtar took one wicket for 55 runs, Mohammad Sami went wicketless and gave away 51 runs in the six overs he bowled and Rana Navedul Hasan 67 for his one wicket. This is unacceptable.

Pakistan needs to decide whether it can afford to play both Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Sami in the ODI's. In test matches, certainly but two genuine fast bowlers is a luxury in the one-day game unless they have immaculate control over line and length. Pakistan is missing Shabbir Ahmed and Umar Gul.

The Platinum Jubilee celebrations of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) were a bit of a damp squib if they were confined only to handing shawlas and silver salvers to some selected captains of India and Pakistan.

I don't know if the invitations came from the BCCI or whether the PCB selected the Pakistan captains. It is possible that some of ex-Pakistan captains declined for one reason or the other. But the absence of Fazal Mahmood was glaring.

So too was the absence of Mushtaq Mohammad, Asif Iqbal, Majid Khan, Javed Burki and most of all Wasim Akram who was probably in India on his commentary assignments. From India's side I noticed that Sunil Gavaskar and Mansur Ali Khan ('Tiger' Pataudi) were not present.

Of course Azharuddin could not have been asked because he's in the doghouse. While it was entirely appropriate that the match should have been between India and Pakistan, it was also the best way to maximize revenue.

And finally to the Kolkata crowd a raspberry for its lack of sportsmanship. Salman's century was greeted but a deafening silence from the 100, 000 strong crowd. Was there not one among them who was prepared to congratulate a young man who played a masterly innings?