Lankans Deceived

Well it has been a very long time since I last held a pen in my hand to blog something about cricket. But, I blame it all on the lack of some or any convincing turn around that really went on in the world of international cricket really. Still, I thought that waiting further for the same would just mean losing my fans who have encouraged me till here. So, I drew some points from the on going test series which featured Pakistan after almost a year or so. And they did the very same in a more decent manner whatsoever. The just showed the cricketing world that they haven't yet forgotten the game of cricket and test cricket in particular.

If Sri Lanka who were facing Pakistan after their debacle against India off late had two players, whom they had thought to have made a difference to their team, they were totally mistaken. For, even the Pakistani test team was well equipped with war heads like Younis Khan who put up a fighting triple century. In the process, Younis Khan became the third Pakistani batsmen to notch up a triple hundred. So, it is now left for the remaining subcontinental teams namely India and Sri Lanka to boast of another batsmen to have scored a triple hundered. Sri Lanka and India have two batsmen who have scored triple hundreds with Pakistan making it three.

For Pakistan, there have been three batsmen off late namely Hanif Mohammed, Inzamam Ul Haq and recently Younus Khan who have a double hundred against their name. While India have two triple hundreds, both of them being scored by Virender Sehwag alone and on the other hand, Sri Lanka too have two batsmen in Sanath Jayasuriya and Mahela Jayawardane to have notched up a triple hundred for their country. This has always been the case with a test match being held on Pakistani soil. Every match played on Pakistani soil becomes a batsmen's paradise and a bowlers' nightmare. More so in the India's tour of the country in early 2006.

In the first two of the three test matches, there were four Pakistani and two Indian batsmen who scored a hundred only to see the first encounter end in a draw. In the second encounter, debutant pacer R P Singh was named the man of the match in the drawn test for taking four wickets. This was the fate of test cricket. All that the first two test matches could witness was smashes from the bat of Shahid Afridi, who hit Harbhajan Singh for four consecutive sixes. And in the first test, Rahul Dravid and Virender Sehwag lost out on putting a record first wicket partnership of 413 when Virender Sehwag lost out hastingly when the scoreboard read 410.