STATISTICAL ANALYSIS
Follow Us24 ODIs, 39 ODIs and 10 ODIs.
One is built muscularly, one gifted with a golden left arm, and the other is neither.
One touches 150 kmph for fun, the other can leave hearts racing, and the other looks nowhere as intense as the other two.
But one look at his bowling, you will be mistaken, as he is the deadliest of the three. Clean-shaven, flowing hair and unbounded jazbaa are traits that define the 20-year-old Naseem Shah.
Pakistan’s tryst with pacers is well-known, perhaps it is one of the long-standing folklore in cricketing history.
Every now and then, there is an addition, with the search for a third pacer taking them to multiple venues and names – including Mohammad Wasim, Hasan Ali, Mohammad Hasnain, Faheem Ashraf and even Shahnawaz Dahani, but none as fitting the puzzle as the 20-year-old named Naseem.
As his name suggests, he is that breath of fresh air that Pakistan desperately needs. Naseem is relatively new to the ODI scene, but in his short white-ball stint already, he has shown that he belongs at the highest level, producing a near match-winning spell against England last year in the T20 World Cup final.
Even though it is zero wickets on paper, the right-arm pacer exerted so much pressure during his spell that every one of his 15 dot balls threatened to knock over an English batter. It is that form and aggression that has translated to the ODIs.
In just ten ODIs, Naseem has exactly shown why you should fear him. Since his debut, amongst all pacers, no one has a better strike-rate than him (20.9), and his average (16.1) is also the best amongst all bowlers in the time frame.
That isn’t all, the right-arm pacer has the ability to pick up wickets at the snap of the fingers. When bowling with the new ball, the right-arm pacer seems friendly at once but then threatens to end the batter’s career with deliveries that swing either way and some swing both ways in one delivery.
In the first ten overs, Naseem has been just the perfect foil for Shaheen Afridi's sheer aggression, with seven wickets, averaging 23.6. With Shaheen more or less accounting for early wickets, the right-arm pacer’s job has been to pile the pressure up, resulting in the others reaping the rewards.
With Naseem in the team, Pakistan’s bowling unit has averaged 30.89, picking up 77 wickets while conceding runs at just 5.15 per over. But when you filter it further down to just the pace unit, they have struck 60 times in Naseem’s presence, averaging 22.46, striking every 25th delivery at a level that is quite insane.
When you dig deeper, whenever the right-arm pacer has missed a game since making his debut, the Men in Green’s pace unit has averaged 27.10, which is almost a five-run jump, with the strike-rate reading 30. That essentially means that Naseem has only made the bowling unit more lethal.
But how was it this lethal in the first place?
Enter Shaheen Afridi.
Shaheen’s impact is immediate, almost like giving your fainted Pokemon a Max potion, which instantly recuperates its health. The left-arm pacer is just that: he’s always in-your-face, straight-up aggressive, making the ball dance to his tunes.
Sometimes, they swing back into the right-hander; sometimes, they hold the shape; the other times, they just shatter the timbers. Shaheen first started like Naseem as a talented youngster but, over the years, has transformed himself as a leader. He is still only 23.
The left-arm pacer’s impact is perhaps why Pakistan’s bowling unit is considered scary. Since 2020, Shaheen has picked up 13 powerplay wickets, and one of the primary reasons why he has threatened the batters is his ability to hit the wickets.
Amongst bowlers to have played at least ten ODIs, the left-armer ranks third on the list, hitting the stumps 27.5% of his deliveries, only behind Pakistan’s Mohammad Wasim and New Zealand’s Blair Tickner.
The astonishing fact is that the left-arm pacer has had quite a lukewarm last three years – with just 36 wickets – constantly bogged down by injuries.
But his return against Afghanistan in the recently concluded three-match ODI series showed why he is lethal. Shaheen picked up six wickets in the series, including two in the first ODI in Hambantota, to break Afghanistan’s batting back.
If you think that’s already lethal, wait.
The third component of this unit is pace himself, Haris Rauf. Rauf’s breakthrough came via the Australian Big Bash League. It was the T20s, and he is still revered for his display in the game's shortest format.
But his numbers in the 50-over format are stellar. Barring the odd innings, Rauf has been a consistent wicket-taker for the Men in Green. In fact, he is currently Pakistan’s jazbaa, junoon and jaan – all in one.
In just 24 ODIs, the speedster has picked up 44 wickets, out of which 22 wickets have come at the death, a time when bowlers usually travel the distance. At his pace, it is natural to be sometimes wayward, but Rauf is built differently.
Not only is he consistent, but he is also deadly, a package that only makes him fearsome. When you think that every delivery that comes out of his hand is quicker than the other, he slips in the knuckle delivery that has often knuckled out of the opposition. The fact that he has 22 wickets in 18 innings, while Alzarri Joseph has 29 in 30 innings – only shows his prowess.
Maybe he will be considered a one-trick pony if it is just his death bowling. But the fact that Rauf is quintessentially a one-fit for many occasions’ bowler, Pakistan couldn’t have asked for anything more. Add to that he is the fourth-highest wicket-taker in all ODIs since 2020 (amongst the top ten nations), which only makes it scarier.
Well, three-fourths of it is done.
Now remains the crucial part – Shadab Khan, Mohammad Nawaz and Mohammad Wasim Jr – all of whom have played a significant part in Pakistan’s rise to No.1 ODI ranking. With Shadab, Pakistan solved one of their long-standing problems, the spin-bowling department, and if you add Nawaz to that, it makes for a decently good spin pair.
But it is Wasim Jr, who has managed to carve out a niche in a team filled with superstars. You can remove Wasim from the team, and you seemingly won’t find a difference at first, but as games get to a crucial stage and Babar Azam looks around, he will be missing his go-to-bowler.
North Wazirastan’s own Wasim is a crucial blending piece in the Pakistani puzzle. The right-arm pacer has played 15 ODIs, and his presence has already been felt, with 24 wickets, averaging 25.66 with the ball, including a four-wicket haul.
He might not have an aura like the aforementioned trio, but perhaps that crucial glue element will be missing in Pakistan’s bowling arsenal without him.
****
Given that it is the Asia Cup, our minds gravitate towards that comment.
“It might not be as...I wanted to use a word but I can't use that word. It's coming out of my mind but I can't use it here,” Rahul Dravid had to say ahead of the Super Four encounter between India and Pakistan last year.
Since then, that four-letter word has become a phenomenon. Given that all of them are capable of both swinging and reverse-swinging the ball, it only makes Pakistan’s bowling unit ‘sexy’. Naseem Shah’s stunning form only makes them ‘sexier’ ahead of the Asia Cup.
