Just fan, not enemy within

The 21 year old Ripon Chowdhury of India and Umer Daraz age 22 of Pakistan surely never met each other and I doubt if they even hear names of each other in 2016. They are still living apart but the only common thing between them is both are cricket fans. Then what makes them so important to write on it is again their cricket’ fan following but strangely in opposite direction. As the Indian Ripon Chowdhury loves Shahid Afridi and Pakistani Umer Daraz is a hardcore fan of Virat Kohli. Both the fans hardly know each other but for liking opponent teams’ cricketers of the subcontinent they have been penalized in the irrespective  countries, which is very uncommon and unfortunate for the game.

Cricketing rivalry between India and Pakistan is one of the leading sports rivalries of the planet. Despite that, the two teams do only play against each other in ICC’ multiple teams events and any bilateral series between both have been on hold since Pakistan made a short tour in 2012. In the absence of cricketing ties, gulf between both has only widened further. Now with the police arrests of both Ripon Chowdhury and Umer Daraz, it seems the animosity between the top authorities of the two nations have gone far ahead.

Ripon Chowdhury, a student from Assam was arrested this month while watching a local cricket tournament wearing Pakistan team jersey and that shirt angered a Hindu nationalist group. Therefore a FIR was also filed against him under section 120 (B), 294 of the Indian Penal Code by a local right-wing outfit.  He was arrested based on the subsequent complaint for indulged in an anti-national act. Later, it was revealed that Ripon is a Shahid Afridi fan and he supports Pakistan cricket team only because of him. So he was released later on after a bail was granted to him.

Umer Daraz, a young tailor by profession, was arrested from his house for hoisting Indian flag on January 25 this year in a village about 200 km from Lahore. The police registered an FIR against him under section 123-A of Pakistan Penal Code and 16 Maintenance of Public Order. He said he had no idea that he committed a crime, urging the authorities to pardon him as he should be seen as "an Indian cricketer's fan and not as a spy.""I am a big fan of Virat Kohli. I support the Indian team because of Kohli. Hoisting of Indian flag on the rooftop of my house only shows my love for the Indian cricketer," Daraz said on his arrest. His room was full of posters of Virat Kohli pasted on walls, served as an evidence of his innocence. Therefore, in spite of charged with sedition, Umer Daraz was later quietly released by officials in the central town of Okara.

The stories of both fans offer food for thought for the authorities of both countries that they shouldn’t be leading their people to a dead end. As fans in both India and Pakistan put the sport above the often-fraught relations between their countries and admired each others' players.

By Naseem Rajput

naseemrajput@hotmail.com

Top 10 Sports Persons of 2016

Cristiano Ronaldo      Football

Cristiano Ronaldo, the Portugal and Real Madrid winger accumulated nearly everything this year, a footballer can get in individual capacity. As captain he lifted the trophy of EURO 2016 for Portugal defeating the host France in the final. Earlier he had guided a month ago his club Real Madrid to win the 2015-16 UEFA Champions League, UEFA Super Cup Super and finally the FIFA Club World Cup all in 2016. That deserved him the prestigious Ballon d'Or by French Magazine and he is also expected to win the FIFA Best Player of the year award 2016, the most coveted trophy for a footballer.

Ravichandran Ashwin        Cricket

Ravichandran Ashwin, the right-arm off break Indian bowler has been adjudged the ICC Player of the Year 2016. One can questions the quality of his talent, he but when it comes to performance this year it is head and shoulder above the rest. In 12 Test he has taken 72 wickets at 23.90 with the help of 8 times 5-wicket haul. That helped India to get Top ICC ranking and win 9 out of 12 Test this year so far, the most by any team this year.  In Twenty-20 this year he is second leading wicket taker with 23 wickets in 17 matches.

Usian Bolt               Athletics

Usian Bolt, the Jamaican sprinter is globally known as Lightening Bolt and he justified this tag this year by attaining the "Triple-Triple" in the Rio Olympics. As he won the Gold in 100 m, 200 m and 4x100 m relay, and more importantly he repeated that feat at Rio for the third time after Beijing 2008 and London 2012, capping his Olympic career with 100% winning record.

Michael Phelps         Swimming

The American swimming great enjoyed again a great year of his great career. Leading the US Olympic Team, Michael Phelps won 5 Gold and single Silver medal in the 2016 Summer Olympics held at Rio de Jenario.  He won Gold in 200 m Medley, 200 m Butterfly, 4x100 Butterfly, 4x100 Medley, 4x200 Medley and Silver in 100 m Butterfly. These five medal in 2016 made him the most decorated Olympian of all time with 28 Olympic medals, including the record 23 Gold. Phelps reportedly has retired form sports in 2016 but he ends this year winning the awards of American Swimmer of the Year, World Swimmer of the Year and FINA Swimmer of the Year.

Simone Biles           Gymnastics

Simone Biles, the US Artistic Gymnast secured four medals the most numbers of medals in Olympics 2016. Making her debut in Olympics, she won  record 4 Gold medals in Gymnastic team events, Women' Vault, Women' Floor Exercises and Balance Beam categories. Although at Rio, Biles made her debut in Olympics but because of her outstanding performance in the event she was chosen by Team USA in the end to be the flag bearer for the closing ceremonies, becoming the first American female gymnast to be given the honor . Which is the reason BBC includes her in  the Top 100 Women in 2016 and she was the finalists of the TIMES Magazine' Person of the Year award for 2016.  

Andy Murray           Tennis

Throughout  2016 Andy Murray had a nick to nick competition with Novak Djokovic in Tennis circuit. The British Tennis star this year lost his battles to Novak Djokovic in the finals of the Australian Open, Madrid Open, Roland Garros and again in the French Open.  However, in the final of the Italian Open he took the revenge and defeated Djokovic in straight sets. Thereafter he went to win the Queen' Club Championship and the biggest Tennis title Wimbledon, defeating Milos Raonic  in the final each time. Then in Rio 2016 he won the Gold medal  and thereafter his back to back title victories in China Open Shinghai Open, Vienna Open and the Paris Masters won him $10,000,000 prize money in a single season for the first time in his career. And, finally in the World Tour Finals Andy Murray had to face the four-time defending champion Djokovic again in the final. where he defeated the Serbian in straight sets. This awarded Murray his first ATP World Tour Finals title, his ninth title of 2016, and ensured that he would hold the year-end No. 1 ranking for the first time.   

Nico Rosberg          Formula 1

Like Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic in Tennis, there remained throughout the year an intense battle in Formula One Car Racing between Mercedes AMG Petronas drivers Luis Hamilton and the Nico Rosberg, which the later won eventually after winning the Abu Dhabi  Grand Prix. It was the first time when the German win the Formula One World Championship in his 18 years career. Although, Rosberg took the lead during the initial quarter of this year by consecutively winning Australian Gran Prix, Bahrain Grand Prix, China Grand Prix and Russian Grand Prix in a series but because of tough fight from Luis Hamilton the World Championship remained undecided till on November 27 when Rosberg won the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. A week after the winning the Championship he  announced his retirement.

Jason Day             Golf

Jason Day attained the number one position in the official World Golf Championship in 2016 with 445.69 points in 40 events ahead of Rory Mcllroy who earned  421.02 points in 42 events. The Australian won one of the most coveted Players Championship in 2016 to amass 10th PGA Tour victory of his overall career and earned over $33 million in prize money on the PGA Tour. Earlier before that triumph he had also won the Arnold Palmer Invitational and the WGC- Dell Match Play to authenticate his claim on top position.  Capping this year Jason Day also won the Greg Norman Medal awarded annually to the best golfer of Australia.

Roman Reigns          WWE   

You may call the WWE a drama set for fixed results, but the event is one of the world most popularly- watched sports with exorbitant telecast rights. Professional wrestler Roman Reigns is therefore gets an automatic place in the world' top 10 athletes in 2016. Presently, he is not the World Heavyweight Champion but retained the title most number of days this year for total 77 days. More dominant thing of this popular wrestling brand is his exposure and charisma in the event, which kept the viewers captivated on screens this year. Besides, that he is the current WWE United States Champion and Pro Wrestling Illustrated ranked him number one among the Top 500 wrestlers in 2016.  

Bahman Golbarnezhad           Para Olympics

Bahman Golbarnezhad, a veteran of Iran-Iraq war where he lost his left leg and thereafter he started his career as Para Olympian cannot be gone unnoticed in 2016 because of his unfortunate demise during the 2016 Summer Para Olympics. In sports he started his professional career first as a wrestler, then he turned to weightlifting and won twelve gold medals and one silver medal before stop weightlifting due to a shoulder injury. He then started cycling in 2006. He was the only Iranian cyclist at the 2016 Paralympics, where he died in an accident while competing in men's C4-5 road cycling event. Since 1960, it was the first time when an athlete lost his life during competition in Olympic and Para Olympic Games. Lots of condolence messages were delivered on his fortunate demise including of Presidents of Rio 2016 and Iran while the Iranian Sitting Volleyball team dedicated their Gold to Bahman Golbarnezhad

By Naseem Rajput

naseemrajput@hotmail.com

Shahid Afridi & his cricket farewell

When you think about Shahid Afridi, it's often about taking aerial route to smash sixes and boundaries or may be bowling quick leg spin deliveries offering little room to batsmen. You can also imagine him giving on-field motivational support to his teammates on every delivery and the first one to hug every bowler when he gets wicket. Even if he is in dressing room you would find him sitting in a front row verbally lapping batsmen on crease, always in loud words. In short, if he is in team you would never miss him in the game, as he is every time in the play till the end. He is such a complete and ideal package of a team player, always required in the squad. 

I do not know the numbers how many times I met him and to be honest I do not want to remember that because I always have desired to watch him in action, in play and in grounds. He is one of such persons whose actions speak louder than word, so I am aware when he is sitting among his friends he is always more with his cricket rather them. In spite he is the friend of friends.

In recent days he is not with the national team, which is almost a settled squad at least in limited overs formats and to do not require the services of Boom Boom anymore. But we can’t be deprived from to remember and miss him playing in Green shirt. And, as reported he was tired, not retired, which was the reason he is not in the national team.

 Despite he is still in action in the game and his performance in the Bangladesh Premier League is as usually praiseworthy. Leading the Rangpur Riders in the BPL 2016-17 season his 17 wickets in 11 matches at 14.94 include him among the top five bowlers of the event. While in batting again his 119 runs in total are attained with an astonishing strike rate of almost 142 with the help of 7 sixes and equal number of boundaries.

Arguably, it’s not the performance but the quality of the League which raise meager credentials for him to convince selectors for getting him into the national team, where one ideally desires to bid farewell his international cricket. And, it is onto selectors whether they find him suitable enough for national outfit or not. But the Pakistan Cricket Board will have to do more in this regard and they must devise a stage-farewell where cricketing greats like Shahid Afridi can see off the international cricket honorably and nobly. Perhaps the platform of the Pakistan Super League 2017 be a perfect podium to farewell him, which can appease all the stakeholders associated with this issue and more importantly the fans (including me) of Shahid Khan Afridi.     

By Naseem Rajput

naseemrajput@hotmail.com

Super Expert Lahore Qalandars Anchor Naseem Rajput.8/17/2016

YEH HAI CRICKET PAKISTAN 7/29/2016 Part.3

Dead wickets leading Pakistan cricket to death

At the end of the second day of the first Test match at Brisbane, Pakistan was at 97 runs for 8 wickets in reply to Australia’ 429 runs. Clearly, Pakistan is in deep trouble in the match and as usually Pakistani batsmen seemed incapable to bat on fast and bouncy wickets while bowlers were lacking experience to generate spark and rhythm in their bowling. The big question is why always the same happens? The answer lies in a famous quote “Man is what he eats”. And, the interpretation is what Pakistani cricketers sow on dead wickets in their domestic cricket at home cannot reap fruits on the deadly wickets abroad.

One of the best and latest examples is the recently concluded Grade 1 final of the Qaid  e Azam  Trophy -- the Pakistan premier domestic event – between WAPDA and HBL, which ended after three days of boring cricket as drawn, yet resulting in the triumph of WAPDA as the domestic champion on dubious rule of first inning lead. HBL despite giving WAPDA an almost impossible target of 444 runs to chase lost the match just because WAPDA had slender advantage of first inning lead of 42 runs. What is more noticeable, around 1200 runs scored in the match with the fall of 24 wickets. More disappointing was during the last two and half days only 4 wickets were fallen down, proving the pitch as “the graveyard of bowlers” yet again.         

It is generally happened that wickets everywhere help batsmen during first two or three days and later when the cracks developed in the pitch they begin to assist bowlers. But here in Karachi’ decisive match of the season, bowlers were helpless in the last three days and it was very depressing the way the final of our premier domestic event was concluded.  In the end, the barren National Stadium of Karachi was really in mourning on the dead cricket of Pakistan. 

 Five centuries were scored in total during the final match including two by Salman Butt in each innings and young Imam ul Haq’ 200 not out. Fakhar Zaman scored 170 while Ahmed Shahzad also scored 104 runs. While at the end of the season Kamran Akmal emerged as the leading batsman of the season with 1035 runs.

With these results and batting performances if tried and tested cricketers Salman Butt, Kamran Akmal and Ahmed Shahzad are called back in the national team, the national selection committee under their head Inzamam ul Haq will really be doing nothing but repeating, time and again, the same mistake.

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And, would the young and promising Imam ul Haq be given chance to show his potential at international cricket for his 200 not out in the final? One of my friends jokingly declared that the dead wicket in the final was deliberately made batting-friendly, only to make ease for chief selector Inzamam ul Haq’ nephew, who using this podium make his double ton as a credential to knock the door in the national team. But, I doubt in such credentials as performers on dead wickets are often proved dead fish on result-oriented tracks.    

By Naseem Rajput

naseemrajput@hotmail.com

Red Card to the new Cricket Law

The recent development in cricketing laws definitely has its pros and cons. Player are usually penalized for misconduct in terms of warning,  cut in match fees or any other monetary form but to eject them from the field has some concerns.

“As Guardian of laws” Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) has been playing a significant role in development of cricket and the MCC World Cricket Committee remained vital in shaping up the rules and regulations of the game. Therefore “to cover the most extreme cases of violence on the pitch”, the committee seek to empower umpires at all level to eject or send off players from the field over act of violence and threats to anyone in the field.

 Though the idea of sending off cricketer from field for inappropriate behavior or misconduct is not new in the game, as in 2001 talks were surface of a football-style card system for infield over-exaggeration and again in 2007 most of the ICC’ elite panel umpires publicly showed their dissent for the introduction of red card system in cricket. However it is the first time in 229-year cricket history that the idea has got any legal recommendation to seek amendments in laws for the subsequent rule effected from October 2017.

It has been suggested that “threatening an umpire, physically assaulting another player, umpire, official or spectator; or any other act of violence” will be considered a sending-off offence and result in a team being reduced to ten players for the remainder of the match. Mike Brearley, who chaired last week the committee’s two-day meeting in Mumbai says “we had a survey of umpires and 40% said they’d considered giving up because of abuse and anecdotal evidence from league cricket is that behaviour has got a lot worse. Umpires have to be respected and given the best possible chance of doing their jobs.”

                                                      

Although, the technical aspects of how the law will be implemented are yet to be decided – a red card or introduction of any new umpiring signal – to send off player, but the main thing is does the idea is beneficial or suitable enough in cricket to eradicate the menace of sledging and misconduct from the game? The obvious answer wouldn’t be a definite “yes”.

It is therefore hoped the International Cricket Council (ICC) would see the recommendation judiciously. As the MCC can be the custodians of the laws but it is the ICC, who has the prerogative to legislate for every contingency which might arise in the international game.

But it must be noted that the ICC cannot rely only on the Spirit of Cricket to sort these things out. The game demands complete impartiality and sensibility on behalf of cricket governing body for that.

Therefore rather than sending-off any player it is wiser and more appropriate if the ICC judiciously comes to  implement the ICC Code of Ethics in letter and spirit.

By Naseem Rajput

naseemrajput@hotmail.com

Naseem Rajput' Sports Blog: Baist Ali; always a controversial figure?

Naseem Rajput' Sports Blog: Baist Ali; always a controversial figure?: Once again former Test cricketer in Pakistan cricket team coach Basit Ali has become controversial in women cricket team. According to ...

Baist Ali; always a controversial figure?

Once again former Test cricketer and coach Basit Ali has become controversial in national women cricket team. According to reliable sources of women  cricket team management Basit Ali had heated arguments with the national cricket team captain over team selection matters during which the coach used abusive language against of females. Also, some players of the national women cricket team thought that Basit Ali attitude was not up to the standard of a national team coach.

It must be noted that as a Pakistan Women cricket team coach Basit Ali is having his second stint and like in the past women cricketers have criticized him on his behaviors and attitude again this time.  

The recent women cricket team' tour to New Zealand was totally flop where the team lost all their matches and even thereafter Pakistan lost twice in recently concluded Asia Cup when it lost final against arch rival India, 

Besides being the coach of national women cricket team , Basit Ali is also the chairman of Junior selection committee and coach of the SNGPL team. Neither anybody can perform all such duties and responsibilities at a time nor Basit Ali should be asked to perform all of them judiciously.

By Naseem Rajput

naseemrajpu@hotmail.com