The Signature Style of our very own Lala
It was the 9 pm News of PTV on 4th October 1996, a pleasing yet shocking news came that Pakistan has set 372 total against Sri lanka in a match of Safari Cup. The instant reaction was, “WHAT”, I was looking at my uncle and he was looking at me, and we both were amazed at such performance of team Pakistan against the world champions of that time. The man of that moment was a young guy named Shahid Khan Afridi who became the youngest century maker in the history of One Day Internationals. It was the fastest Century of all times as well. Today same guy is celebrating his 31st birthday while he is on the mission world cup. He became captain for the world cup after a great effort and patience. He is the only captain in the history of Pakistan who led the team in T20 world cup, and ICC Cricket World Cup. In two previous games of world cup team has won and as a captain he has done a fairly good job, and in coming games we are expecting much more.
Almost every cricketer who reached to the pinnacles of fame have a story, some of them have very interesting one. Shahid Afridi is one of them, he replaced Mushtaq Ahmed for Safari Cup as a leg spinner, and in his second match, he emerged as the most unpredictable all rounder ever, scoring fastest century and becoming famous for scoring runs in no time or getting out early. Eventually he improved his bowling role, his quick shooters have always been his lethal weapon, but now he is capable of bowling accurate googlies and flippers too.
Someone said that, after Sachin Tendulkar if there is anyone has so many records that is Shahid Afridi, well I still doubts it therefore I am still searching for the facts. However, it is true that our very own Lala has got many records in his pocket, some of them are quite interesting such as, hitting the longest six ever, hitting the 12 runs on one ball, hitting 4 sixers in a row in a Test Match, 3 out of 6 fastest centuries in ODI belongs to him, he is the only player to get 5 wickets in world cup debut as a captain, well that is the best bowling figures by any captain and any Pakistani in world cup now, he is the one who hit the most sixers so far and soon will reach the land mark of 3oo sixers. Right now, he is enjoying his newly achieved landmark f getting 300 ODI wickets.
He has become the third Pakistani to reach 300 wickets mark, and he is the second all-rounder to score more than six thousand runs and getting 300 wickets with more than 100 catches in the field. He is one of a kind cricketers been involve in controversies like spoiling the surface of the pitch, being violent to a cricket fan, and most famous ball tempering, but still he never sold the country like many others did. He did all those bad things in order to win, well it is not justification he did wrong and it is true. He never spoiled his and the name of country by being involved in match fixing affairs, and perhaps this is the biggest reason I like this guy. Otherwise, my brother can tell better that to what extent I used to like Afridi as a cricketer because of his frustrating and inconsistent batting performance.
Today, as I said before, he is a man on a mission and I am very much optimistic that he will lead the team to the second round of the big event after long 12 years. Over the years he has become one of the respectable figure among the team members that is why he is also known as Lala (elder Brother). With all the best of luck for the coming world cup matches and his career, I would love to say Happy Birthday Lala.
its amazing blog. and thanks for this
that was specially for you Laly
thanks you
Well written Rai
One thing that i am impressed with is the fact that shahid afridi is rarely out of team because of fitness problems (unlike other Pakistani players). He didn’t let himself go. Looking at his fitness and age, he has plenty of cricket left and can come up with some strong records at the end of his game.
Good luck for the World Cup Team Pakistan.