What
Woolmer Promised ...
By Nadeem Akram
Once upon a
time, not too long ago though, there lived in the
land of the pure million upon millions of unsuspecting
and gullible people who believed in anything and
everything but themselves. These simple folks had
little going for them: politicians short-changed
them, the 'bum' hype dissipated long before the
dust settled in the new world; hollow promises and
meaningless slogans proved to be just that. All
that they had going for them was Bob and his pledge
to turn the improbable into a possibility. Bob had
promised the nation to deliver what all other spin-doctors
could not: a living and breathing 'Team Pakistan'.
All Bob asked in return was for the folks to look
the other way while he and his cohorts went about
chopping one young lad after another in order to
find the winning combination.
The nice people
of the land of the pure believed that Bob could
resurrect the freak that once obliterated Goliath
in his own backyard and wrested the prized trophy
from the clutches of the infidel, which they believed
belonged to the men in green in the first place!
Bob enjoyed absolute authority, not to mention a
forgiving and benevolent employer, to carry out
his experimentation with impunity. He had to make
this thing work come what may. No questions asked.
A career trampled here, a compromise made there,
was of little concern to Bob and his benefactors
as long as the little people believed that they
had a thing or two coming their way. And so it went
on for a while and then the spell was broken. David
met Goliath and history for once did not repeat
itself. The eternal enemy gave the dream team a
run for their money and it was them who had the
last laugh.
And that was
not the end of it. Our Frankenstein kept on losing
a limb or two even when facing an adversary even
Bangladesh could have beaten with a hand tied behind
their back. Few eyebrows were raised initially,
then a few heads shook, followed by whispers which
turned into protests and Bob, for the first time,
felt that the next head to be rolled could be his.
That forced Bob to go back to the drawing boards
and see what could be done to make this thing up
and running. He found himself between a rock and
hard place. No one likes to be pinned against the
wall least of all Bob who had everything going for
him. Despite his good table manners and cockney
accent, Bob was having a hard time convincing the
ones who mattered that it was only a matter of time
when his 'It' would be up and running.
His team building
mantra was losing air and he knew it. He needed
a miracle; divine intervention that would get him
a new lease of life. Bob was asked to brave his
concoction against the best of the very best. Bob
had it all figured out by the time he boarded the
flight to Down Under. If they lose it would be dismissed
as a defeat against an impregnable foe and if by
a miracle he manages to pull one out of the hat,
he would go down the history as the man who made
Frankenstein come to life. It was a win-win situation
for all concerned even for the burly clubman who
got a second life when Bob was busy making compromises.
So Bob led his troops to the slaughterhouse, without
losing one night of his beauty sleep knowing well
that all that could be lost would be a career of
a youngster or two and if Kamran Akmal to be one
of them so be it! All he had to do was to Wool'em
and he would home free! What went down under is
known to every red-blooded greenie living in the
land of the pure and like myself most of them voluntarily
divorced themselves from ever setting an eye on
the one-eyed monster that beamed the terrible scenes
of the greenie monster being ravaged and pillaged
by the Aussie attack and shamelessly grasping for
straws while drowning in the sea of ignominy and
shame.
But kudos to
Dr Bob and his company, they never took a defeat
seriously and went on with their experimentation
till the end. If the top order faltered, fresh meat
was offered for the taking. Heaven forbid if the
tail failed to wag, they had it removed with surgical
precision all in the name of finding the right mix,
whatever that means. What Bob did not do, which
he should have done, was to get rid of the cadaver
used, as the middle-order that he inherited from
his predecessors and for some odd reasons so jealously
guarded by him. May be his salvation lies in protecting
the holy cows, after all cows are known to be the
cause of many riots in this part of the world. It
would be futile to recap the misadventures of Dr
Bob and his accomplices in their quest to murder
our national pride, which by the way they have done
with utmost of ease, thanks to their inability to
think and their incapacity to plan but that is another
story.
Any mention
of a number of things that went wrong during the
last two games played in Australia would mean increased
consumption of Alka Seltzer and since it is a suspect
drug by many standards I would spare the readers
the agony of taking one at the expense of their
mental ease. Suffice to say that we are a nation
that continues to suffer at the hands of men who
do not enjoy our blessing to wear our national colors.
Much as we would like to be heard when Dr Bob or
whoever decides to play Taufiq Umar, who has not
played a single international shot in the last ten
months, or Muhammad Hafiz who averages just over
17 with a strike rate of 51 per 100 balls to replace
Salman Butt or Yasir Hamid is not meant to be. If
lessons need to be learnt, we need not to go to
look towards the Western hemisphere, there are plenty
in our own neighborhood. Ganguly stuck with Kaif
and Yuvraj despite their earlier failures and look
where they are compared to Imran Farhat and Yasir
Hamids of our ilk.
If Tendulkar
can be forced to open or not to open an inning if
the team requires so, I am at a loss to understand
why Yohanna or Inzamam would shy away from batting
at number three? Why is it that we sacrifice a wicket
simply because these gentlemen are not at ease to
face the new ball? Time and again it has been proven
beyond doubt that no matter who you play at number
three, it is inevitable that either Yohanna or Inzamam
would be there to face the brunt of the new ball
because none of the sacrificial lambs offered to
opposition are good enough to provide the much needed
cushion for the holy cows of Pakistani cricket.
So why bother sending Younis Khan or Muhammad Hafiz?
But then we are not to question why? Learning from
our mistake is simply not our forte. However, we
yearn to devise and most definitely like to improvise,
which works at times but then it does not most of
the time.
The tour Down
Under was just that, most of the time! I am tempted
to go on and on and pray for the fat lady to sing
and rid me of this pain, but I dare not since the
last she sang was not a pleasant experience for
all of us Pakistanis, if you know what I mean! I
am not at all qualified to question the know-it-all
since I am neither an ex-cricketer nor a bureaucrat
not even a sports journalist; I am merely an ordinary
Joe who represents the much-touted silent majority.
I am the person who pays for all those silly commercials
that run beyond their allocated time. I am the Allah
Ditta or Khuda Buksh Jokhio who spends hours braving
heat and police batons only to sneak a glimpse of
our heroes exiting the airport lounge. We are the
ones who risk our lives climbing electric poles
and water tanks to hoist our national flag because
we are proud to be Pakistanis. Therefore, it is
us who need an explanation and not the hoity-toity
executives exchanging pleasantries in their well-furnished
offices in the cultural capital of the country!
