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Subject: The Legends of Cricket
Replies: 22 Views: 10798
royal28 25.09.09 - 07:54am
Shoaib Akhtar (Punjabi, Urdu: ; born 13 August 1975 in Rawalpindi, Punjab) is a Pakistani cricketer, and is one of the fastest bowlers in the world, earning him the name Rawalpindi Express. He set a world record by clocking 160.9 km/h (100 mph) twice. His ability to bowl fast yorkers, well disguised slow ba11s, swinging deliveries (including reverse swing), and sharp bouncers have made him lethal even on dead pitches.
However, he has never been far from controversy, often accused of not being a team player. Shoaib was sent back home from a tour in Australia in 2005. A year later he was embroiled in a drug scandal after testing positive for a banned substance. However, the ban imposed on him was lifted on appeal. In September 2007, Shoaib was banned by the PCB for an indefinite period for the alleged brawl with his team-mate Mohammad Asif.[1] On 1 April 2008 Shoaib was banned for five years for publicly criticizing the policies of the Pakistan Cricket Board.[2] As of October 2008, the La High Court has suspended the 5 year ban until the hearing for the case takes place and Shoaib has been named in the 15-man squad for the Twenty20 Quadrangular Tournament in Canada.Shoaib made a strong comeback in his first game in the IPL for the Kolkata Knight Riders against the Delhi Daredevils. Defending a low score of 133, Shoaib took four top order wickets which ultimately led to the Daredevils being restricted to 110. He ended with figures of 4-11 from three overs, a performance which earned him the player of the match award.[7][8] Shoaib denied that he had any point to prove with his performance, stating, I just wanted to win the game. Knight Riders' captain Sourav Ganguly also acknowledged Shoaib's performance, He came to the country with lots [of things] happening behind him...But he showed a lot of character.[9] It has been widely reported that the Knight Riders have released Akhtar from his IPL contract due to his injury history but the Knight Riders' officials have denied these reports and said they are still in talks with the fast bowler
Shoaib has played for three counties in English county cricket: Somerset (2001), Durham (2003 and 2004) and Worcestershire (2005). He did have his moments of success (for example, taking 5-35 for Durham against Somerset in the National League in 2003, and claiming 6-16 in the same competition for Worcestershire against Glamorgan two years later) but he also suffered from fitness problems, as well as a perception that he was less than interested in his task. This was particularly the case at Worcestershire: chairman John Elliott said Players like that are no good to our club. In fact, Shoaib has been no good for any club he's been at. He's a superstar and just does what he wants.
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royal28 27.09.09 - 07:44am
Saeed Anwar (Urdu: , born September 6, 1968 in Karachi, Pakistan) is a former Pakistani opening batsman. A stylish left-hander, Anwar is most notable for scoring 194 runs against India in Chennai, a record total in ODI cricket, equalled by Zimbabwean opener Charles Coventry in August 2009.An opening batsman capable of dismantling even the best bowling attacks, Anwar was an attacking batsman in one-day matches and once settled in Test matches, scored quickly and all over the field. His success came from good timing and wrist flicks rather than physical power, and Anwar became famous for his trademark flick. He was able to lift a ball that had pitched outside off stump for six over midwicket. Anwar's timing and ability to score quick runs made him a crowd favourite. He was named as a Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1997.
Saeed Anwar's career performance graph.
Anwar was the first Pakistani batsman to score a century against India on Indian soil in a one-day match. He has the highest Test batting average (59.06) of any Pakistani against Australia, and once scored three consecutive centuries against them. He scored a classic century against South Africa in Durban, which allowed Pakistan to win a Test match for the first time in South Africa.
On May 21, 1997 in Chennai, Anwar scored 194 against India in an ODI match.[1] This was the highest individual score by any batsman in the world. Charles Coventry equalled the feat on August 16 2009, against Bangladesh.[2]
Anwar is a member of the exclusive club of batsmen who have scored three successive hundreds in ODIs, with hundreds against Sri Lanka, West Indies and Sri Lanka during the 199394 Champions Trophy in Sharjah. He scored two successive hundreds on three other occasions in his career, and was the first batsman to complete this feat in ODIs.Anwar holds the highest individual score in an ODI match (194). He has scored two or more successive hundreds on four occasions. He holds the highest Test batting average (59.06) of any Pakistani against Australia in Test matches, and made 20 hundreds in one day internationals as a Pakistan opening batsman.
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royal28 27.09.09 - 07:52am
Saqlain Mushtaq (Urdu: ) (born December 29, 1976 in La , Punjab) is a Pakistani cricketer, regarded as one of the finest off spin bowlers of all time.[1] He is best known for pioneering the doosra, which he employed to great effect during his career. Saqlain has not been active in international cricket since 2004.
Saqlain made his international debut in September 1995 playing against Sri Lanka at Peshawar.[2] He picked up four wickets at an average of 26.75 in the first test of the series.[3] The highlight of his Test career came in the away series against India in January/February 1999, where he achieved his first ten wicket haul in a test match.[4] In the first test, with India needing only 17 runs to win, Saqlain effectively sealed Pakistan's win by taking the wicket of Sachin Tendulkar who had scored 136.[5] He ended the series with excellent figures, taking twenty wickets at an average of 20.15, which earned him the Man of the Series award.Saqlain is credited with the invention of the doosra, an off-spinner's delivery which is bowled with an action very similar to that of an off-break.[8] However, it spins in the opposite direction (i.e. from the leg side to the off side), easily confusing batsmen, making it a very effective weapon.[15] Saqlain became well-known for this variation ball, which was integral to his success, although he received criticism for overusing it.[2]
His other variation was the arm-ball, which again uses a similar action to the off-break, but causes the ball to go straight on without turning.[citation needed]
During his time at Surrey, Saqlain worked on developing new deliveries which he calls the teesra and the chotha.[16] However little else is known about these deliveries
After his major injury in 2004, Saqlain spent almost three years out of cricket[12], actively promoting the religion of Islam in local communities.
After marrying a British citizen, Saqlain gained a British passport, which made him eligible to play for England after a four-year qualification period that ended in April 2008. *
royal28 6.10.09 - 03:40pm
Carl Llewellyn Hooper (born December 15, 1966 in Georgetown, Guyana) is a former West Indian cricket player and captain.
He was a right-handed batsman and off-spin bowler, who came to prominence in the late 1980s in a side that included such phenomenal talent as Gordon Greenidge, Desmond Haynes, Malcolm Marshall and Courtney Walsh and represented the West Indies over a 21-year international career.
His highest innings score of 233 was made during a Test series in India in 2001. He has made 5762 runs in his Test cricket career. Hooper could be an erratic Test batsman, as his low average of 36.46 over 102 Tests shows. In ODI play, Hooper's aggressive style of batting fared better: he averaged 35.34 off 227 matches.
Hooper represented Guyana at local first-class level, and played English county cricket for Kent and Lancashire. In 2003, Hooper became only the second player to have scored a century against all 18 county teams.[1]
Hooper holds the accolade of being the first cricketer in the world to have scored 5000 runs, taken 100 wickets, held 100 catches and received 100 caps in both ODIs and Tests, a feat only matched since by Jacques Kallis. [2] In his autobiography, Steve Waugh writes that quickness of feet and sweet yet brutally efficient stroke play were Hooper's trademarks.[3] He was routinely prematurely dismissed, however, after losses in concentration.
Shane Warne also thought very highly of Hooper's footwork and, in 2008, named him among the top 100 cricketers of his time, citing in particular his ability to disguise his dances down the track. Warne felt that determining when a batsman was going to give the charge was one of the most important things for a spinner, and that Hooper was the best at making it indeterminable. During the 1995 series, he wrote, this really nagged away at me, because I couldn't spot any of the usual clues even though I knew there had to be a sign that would give him away. On a number of occasions, I stopped at the point of delivery to see if he was giving anything away with his footwork. Most batsmen would be looking to get out of their ground at that point, whereas Hooper just stayed set. In the end, after watching him closely time after time, I managed to crack it. When he wanted to hit over the top, he just looked at me instead of tapping his crease as usual and looking down. Of course, my knowing what he was going to do did not always stop him from doing it.[4]
Hooper was also a strong slip fielder, usually at second slip. He took numerous catches from the likes of Ambrose and Walsh.
He is one of only 3 players to have scored centuries against 18 different English county sides. *
royal28 9.10.09 - 01:25pm
Stephen James Harmison MBE (born 23 October 1978, Ashington, Northumberland) is an England cricketer, a leading Test match fast bowler and a two-time Ashes winner. He plays county cricket for Durham. With his height (6'4) he can extract pace and bounce from most pitches. While poor form led to him being dropped from the team in New Zealand in 2007, he returned to the England side in 2008 against South Africa.Steve Harmison was first selected for an England squad in May 2000 during the tour to England by Zimbabwe, but did not play. As part of an ECB National Academy touring team that also contained Andrew Strauss, Ian Bell and Robert Key, Harmison showed clear signs of his ability in the tour of Australia in 200102. In August 2002, Harmison made his Test match debut at Trent Bridge against India, replacing the injured Simon Jones.
Originally lacking somewhat in control, he bowled seven consecutive wides in the first match of the tour of Australia, against the ACB Chairman's XI's at Lilac Hill in 2002. However, promising performances later in the tour saw him named in the World Cup squad, although he wasn't used in any of the matches. He was then awarded with a six month central contract by the ECB, but this was not renewed in September 2003.
Despite media complaints about his ability, he was named in the England squad for the winter tour to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, partially due to injuries to other players. Harmison gave a man-of-the-match performance in the opening Test against Bangladesh, taking 9 wickets for 79 on a slow wicket, before succumbing to a back injury and missing the matches against Sri Lanka. Despite the injury, he'd done enough to be selected for the winter tour to the West Indies, and it was there he sealed his arrival, taking 7 wickets at the cost of just 12 runs as the West Indies collapsed to their lowest ever Test total of 47 all out. Harmison went on to win the Man-of-the-Series award after taking 23 wickets in the four Tests.ODI retirement and Sri Lanka
On 21 December 2006, three months before the 2007 Cricket World Cup, Harmison announced his retirement from One Day International cricket after being left out of the squad for the one-day series in Australia. In October 2007, Harmison travelled to South Africa to play domestic cricket before heading to Sri Lanka as part of the England Test squad.[2] After a shaky start, however, he suffered a back injury on the first day of the second warm up match, having taken one wicket.[3] He was not included in the squad for the first test, however he took three wickets in the second.[4] On 21 August 2008, it was announced that Harmison would return to playing One Day International cricket against South Africa.[5]
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royal28 17.04.10 - 01:55pm
Lee is a fast bowler, one of the fastest the game has known, and at his peak was capable of bowling at 161 km/h (100.05 mph). Lee's fastest recorded delivery to date is 160.8 km/h (99.9 mph) which he bowled in his first over on March 5, 2005 at Napier, New Zealand against Craig .[3]
Lee ranked with Pakistani bowler Shoaib Akhtar as the fastest bowler in contemporary cricket during most of this decade.[4] Akhtar's delivery at 161.3km/h (100.23mph) stands as the fastest recorded to date.[5]
Early in his career, Lee was reported for a suspected illegal bowling action, but was cleared.[6] He was also criticised in early 2005 for bowling a series of beamers at batsmen during ODIs, at a rate which lead some to claim he was deliberately bowling illegal head high full tosses at batsmen.[7][8]
Lee is at his most effective on the pitches of the southern hemisphere, where the pitches have greater bounce. In the northern hemisphere, he has taken 53 wickets in 19 Tests at an average of 42.11. In the southern hemisphere, he has taken 178 wickets in 40 matches at 28.48. He has had the most success against the West Indies and New Zealand, averaging in the low twenties. He averages more than 40 against England, Bangladesh and Pakistan, and in the 30s against other teams.[9]
[edit] Childhood and early career
Lee is the second of three sons born to Bob, a metallurgist and Helen (ne Buxton), a piano teacher.[10] He has two brothers, the elder being former Australian all rounder and New South Wales Blues captain Shane Lee. His younger brother Grant played cricket for New South Wales at the under-19 level, and is now an accountant. Lee attended Balarang Public School and Oak Flats High School, which later named its cricket ground in his honour. His nickname 'Bing' refers to 'Bing Lee', after a chain of electronics stores in New South Wales.
The brothers enjoyed soccer, basketball and skiing and were encouraged to play the piano by their mother (Grant is a qualified pianist).[11] Brett was introduced to the game of cricket at the age of eight by his brother Shane. He played his first formal game of cricket for the Oak Flats Rats where he took 6/0 from one over or 6 wickets for 0 runs, all of his wickets being bowled.[citation needed] At sixteen years of age, Lee began playing first grade cricket for Campbelltown, where he managed to claim the wickets of a few New South Wales cricketers. He later joined Mosman, where at one point, he shared the new ball with Shoaib Akhtar.[12] He still lives on the Lower North S of Sydney today, in the suburb of Lane Cove.
Lee also played for the Australian Under 17 & 19 teams and was awarded a scholarship to attend the Australian Cricket Academy.
In March 1994, Lee was forced out of the Australian under-19 team to tour India due to stress fractures in his lower back. He recovered and made his first-class debut for New South Wales against Western Australia in a Sheffield Shield match as a 20-year old in the 199798 season, playing one match and taking 3/114.[13]
One month later, Lee was chosen to represent the Australian A team on a tour to South Africa. He claimed two wickets but in that very match, stress fractures in his back from the previous injury had re-opened and Lee was in a back brace for over three months. When he turned twenty-one, Lee moved to Sydney to be closer to work.[citation needed]
During the 1997-98 season, he played in five of the ten Sheffield Shield games, taking fourteen wickets at 30. He finished outside the top 20 in both the wicket taking list and the bowling averages.[14]
In 1999, during a Sheffield Shield match at Perth, Lee bowled a spell against the Western Australian batsmen, compared the fastest bowling seen in Australia since the days of Jeff Thomson back in the 1970s. From that point, Australian captain Steve Waugh and then vice-captain Shane Warne began pushing for Lee's inclusion in the Test team.
[edit] Test career
[edit] Early Test career
By the late 1990s there were calls for Lee to be included in the national squad. He was eventually chosen in the final 14 for the Test series against Pakistan in 1999 but failed to make the final 11. By the time the Test series against India came around, he was twelfth man. However, he duly made his Test debut for Australia in December 1999 against the touring Indians, becoming Australia's 383rd Test cricketer.
Bowling first change, Lee took a wicket in his first over in Test cricket when he bowled Sadagoppan Ramesh with his fourth delivery. He also captured Rahul Dravid in his first spell before returning to take three wickets in six ba11s to finish the innings with figures of 5/47 from 17 overs. Australia had batted first, and Lee had earlier made 27 runs. Lee took thirteen wickets in his opening two Tests at the low average of 14.15.
Lee won the inaugural Donald Bradman Young Player of the Year Award at the Allan Border Medal award ceremony in 2000 soon after his debut.
During the early 2000 tour to New Zealand, Lee was reported by umpires Srinivas Venkataraghavan and Arani Jayaprakash for a suspected illegal bowling action. He was later cleared.
Lee took 42 wickets in his opening three series, the most by any Australian bowler in the seven matches he played. [15] However, in his seventh Test, where he took seven wickets including a five wicket haul in the second innings against the West Indies, he suffered a stress fracture of the lower back which kept him out of three following Tests. He returned against Zimbabwe but soon suffered another setback a month later when he broke his right elbow and was sidelined until May 2001.
[edit] Return from injury
Lee returned to the international team on the 2001 Ashes tour of England after recovering from an elbow injury. His comeback saw less success than his debut, managing only nine wickets in five Tests at 55.11. However, Lee was back as Australia's leading wicket-taker in the first and third Test against New Zealand later that year, in a series which he captured 5 wickets in the second innings and made a contribution of 61 with the bat in the first Test match. The series ended in a 00 draw. He finished the series with 14 wickets at 25.14. The two home and away series against South Africa were not as productive, yielding 19 wickets in six Tests at 38.42.
Lee only took five wickets in a match on three occasions between the New Zealand series and the 2003 Cricket World Cup. Lee came under pressure for his position after taking only five wickets at 46.50 in the three-Test series against Pakistan in 2002. Andy Bichel, who was filling for the injured Jason Gillespie, took eight wickets at 13.25. With the other frontline bowlers all taking wickets at less than 13,[16] Lee was dropped when Gillespie returned for the first two Tests during the 200203 Ashes series. He returned for the Perth Test, after claiming a five wicket haul in a Pura Cup match against Queensland for New South Wales. He took thirteen wickets at 41.23 in three matches, compared to Bichel's ten at 35.1.[17] After the 2003 Cricket World Cup, Lee took 17 wickets at 28.88 in four Tests against the West Indies. It was the first series in two years where he averaged under 30, and only the second in that period where had averaged under 40.
After a mid year break, he parti ted in a Two Test series against Bangladesh in northern Australia. He took six wickets at 31.66, and was Australia's most expensive bowler, with the other specialist bowlers averaging 15.55 against the lowest ranked team in Test cricket. He followed this with six wickets at 37 in a comfortable 20 Test series against Zimbabwe, in which the other specialist bowlers averaged 23.15.[18]
Against the Indian batting lineup in the 200304 home series, which ended in a 11 draw for Australia, Lee was out of the first two Tests recovering from a torn abdominal muscle, an injury which he sustained during the Zimbabwe series.[19] At that point, Lee decided to undergo surgery to partially repair 'posterior ankle impingement', a condition that Lee was suffering with prior to the Test series against Zimbabwe as well as surgery to repair his torn abdominal muscle, but Lee never fully recovered from the ankle injury and finally broke down against Sri Lanka.This was done so that recovery for both injuries would run concurrently. .
[edit] Loss of Test position
Lee took eight wickets in over 100 overs in the final two Tests against India, taking eight wickets at an average of 59.50. This included conceding a double century to Sachin Tendulkar in the Indians' first innings of 7/705 where Sachin and V.V.S. Laxman freely attacked Lee and other bowlers in the final Test in Sydney. He ended the series with the worst average and economy rate of Australia's front line bowlers.[20]
He was subsequently replaced by fellow fast bowler Michael Kasprowicz in 2004 during the tour of Sri Lanka when Lee's ankle injury worsened, forcing him to return home to have surgery. This injury would force Lee out of the game for 4 months to ensure his full recovery. Lee's form in the Test arena had been ineffective, and from July 2001 to January 2004, he had a Test bowling average of 38.42,[21] compared to an average of 16.07 in his earlier career.
Lee was unable to reclaim his position for eighteen months, when Kasprowicz took 47 wickets at 23.74 in thirteen Tests, taking his wickets at a much lower cost than Lee had done in the previous three years. This included 17 wickets at 26.82 on the spin friendly pitches of the Indian subcontinent, helping Australia to its first whitewash in Sri Lanka, and its first series win in India for 35 years.
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thekings (8)
