If you like cricket, as opposed to just enjoying boundaries, it’s been a tough decade or so. We’re always on the lookout for bowlers who can redress the balance and actually make life difficult for batsmen. Very few are able to do that.
A few years ago, we got quite excited about Mohammad Asif. At first, he justified this excitement, playing cricket from a different age. Later, a series of events led us to conclude that, actually, Mohammad Asif is a dick.
This week he’s returned to Test cricket and despite having several years off, he’s still Pakistan’s best bowler. We’ve got to weigh our hatred of batsmen against our hatred of people who are dicks. Maybe it’s the fact that India and Sri Lanka have conspired to create consecutive innings totals of 426, 760-7, 412-4 and 642 in their current Test series, but, on balance, we hate batsmen more.
Go Mohammad Asif.