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Shoaib malik has been appointed for the sole T20 match against Australia. earlier he was sacked by the PCB for poor leadership qualities but again as no choice left he has been appointed as captain. Shahid Afridi who is the t20 captain of Pakistan has been ban by ICC for tempering the ball.

Afridi, Pakistan’s stand-in captain, was caught by television cameras chewing the ball during Pakistan’s fifth and final One-day International against Australia at the WACA on Sunday night.

“Shoaib Malik has been appointed as captain for the Twenty-20 against Australia in the absence of Shahid Afridi,” PCB announced in a brief statement on Monday. Just a year ago, Malik was sacked as Pakistan captain after leading his team to an embarrassingly one-sided ODI series defeat against Sri Lanka on home soil last January.

At that time, Pakistan coach Intikhab Alam and manager Yawar Saeed described Malik as a ‘loner’ and recommended that he should be replaced with Younis Khan as captain.Younis did succeed Malik as captain but after leading Pakistan to a memorable title-winning triumph in the ICC World Twenty20 championship in England last summer, he decided against carrying on and stepped down as skipper last November. He was replaced by Yousuf, who led Pakistan on the twin tour of New Zealand and Australia.

While Pakistan have been pondering about having a new captain following Mohammad Yousuf’s poor captaincy in Australia, Malik was nowhere in the picture as far as the list of possible candidates was concerned.

However, with Yousuf and Younis not in the Twenty20 squad and Afridi ineligible for the tour-ending MCG clash against the Aussies, the PCB didn’t have many players to choose from.According to insiders in the Pakistan team, the name of Test vice-captain Kamran Akmal was considered but the fumbling glovesman was overlooked because of his poor showing on the tour of Australia.

The option of appointing opening batsman Salman Butt as captain was also discussed. Even Mohammad Asif, the fast bowler who briefly served as Pakistan’s vice-captain two years ago, got a mention but in the end the PCB think-tank voted in favour of Malik.

Ironically, Malik is quite a controversial figure within his team these days.There has been a whispering campaign in the national cricket circles suggesting that Malik could be the man leading a lobby in the Pakistan team that plotted the downfall of Yousuf in Australia. In fact, sources close to Yousuf claimed that the senior batsman suspects that some of the players including Malik deliberately under-performed in Australia where Pakistan lost the Test series 3-0 and the one-day series 5-0.

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Shahid Afridi another 50 mange Pakistan to repeat the T20 performance against Sri Lanka. Afridi scored third consecutive half century to contribute a defendable total of 172. Pakistan disciplined attack did not provide any room to Sri Lankan batsman to even kiss the total. A good knocks from Imran Nazir, Omer Akmal and Abdurrazaq gave confidence to the team to defend the total easily. The series although was a nightmare in which Pakistan lost test and one day series but last two ODI and maiden T20 victory give Pakistan cricket a relief.

A sell-out crowd of 35,000 at the overflowing Premadasa stadium watched the first T20 match between the two teams since the World Twenty20 final in England in June, when Pakistan beat Sri Lanka by eight wickets.

The result was the same as seamer Rana Naved and off-spinner Saeed Ajmal picked up three wickets each to stun the hosts.

Sri Lanka lost wickets at regular intervals with skipper Kumar Sangakkara the only batsman to offer resistance against the fired-up Pakistanis with 38 off 31 balls.

Afridi, who was man of the match in both the semi-final and final at the Worlds, once again won the award as Pakistan ended an otherwise dismal tour of Sri Lanka on a winning note.

Pakistan had lost the preceding Test series 2-0 and conceded the one-dayers by a 2-3 margin during the six-week tour.

Afridi hit two sixes and four boundaries after taking over the Twenty20 team from Test and one-day skipper Younus Khan, who has retired from the shortest format of the game.

“I told the boys before the match that we were world champions and so we should go out there and play like champions,” the 29-year-old Afridi said.

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Shahid Afridi will take place of Younis Khan as captain of Pakistan side. Afridi is enthusisiastic enough to lead the side as his captaincy order from PCB was on his keen interest of leading the side. According to him leading in T20 is not that easy. It really require quick and timely decisions along with game planning.

Afridi, 29, has had a career whose colorfulness is eclipsed among current players only by his turbulent erstwhile Pakistan teammate Shoaib Akhtar. Afridi’s extensive rap sheet includes a four-match ban for insulting opponents and a match umpire; a dressing room dispute with his captain and vice captain over his place in Pakistan’s batting order; sanctions after a girl was found in his room — his explanation that she was seeking his autograph was not accepted — and being fingered as the provocateur two years ago when Akhtar finally lost it and struck a teammate with a bat.

Younis Khan retirement from T20 created the opening for Afridi to step up. He has some experience of leadership in domestic cricket, and there may be a hint of his likely style in his criticisms of Shoaib Malik, Pakistan’s captain before Khan, for not being tough enough with his players.

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There is a talk about Younus Khan statement of twenty 20 cricket is a fun and he is being criticised for that statement. The more or less same comments were given by Ricky Ponting and Andrew Symmond two years ago but at that time the many of the old cricketers agreed withy them but now all the same people disagree because the words come out from Younus Khan mouth and media is always against these poor green shirts guys.

If one analyze the twenty 20 cricket and definitely will conclude that it is a fun game. The players in the field are providing fun for cricket fans.  This is Younus Khan thinking and he feel in that way, every body has its right to say out so he did. If we go behind the popularity of the twenty 20 cricket then the only thing will come in front is money. ICC is making lot of money out of it. Twenty 20 cricket is a product of ICC and the branding is going on to maximise the financial returns from it. This is the reason the world cup tournament is being organised after two years. There is no game in the world whose major world cup is being organised after every two years.

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Pakistan sparkled in a crucial T20 match against Newzealand. None of the batsman of Newzealand stay on the wicket to show a batting display. The wickets fell cheaply and made the way for Pakistan batting to achieve a small total without any difficulty.

Gul was brilliant, he took the ball in 13th over and made Kiwi batsmen busy in comming and going out the field. It was the first time one can see the reverse swing from Umer Gul. None of the bowler sofar manage to do in this competition. Umer Gul accurate yorkers totally destroyed Kiwi batting line up. He manage to be the first bowler who took 5 wickets in the history of T20 cricket.

Umar Gul dedicated this performance to Waqar Younis and Waseem Akram who are considered as legends of reverse swing. I think Umer Gul was so successful in putting the ball in a right spot, he can even bowl out kiwis with apple. All thumbs up goes to Umer Gul. Gul said I have really developed my yorker by watching videos of Waqar and Wasim. They have really helped me,” said Gul. “In Twenty20, you have to be able to bowl the yorker, bouncer and the slower ball. Now I want to be the highest wicket-taker in the tournament.

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The defeat from England put Pakistan into a wary situation where they must have to win its second game against Netherlands with a big margin. There are some calculations below  to recsue Pakistan cricket Position.

If Pakistan is batting first, it has to win by 25 runs or more. So if pakistan makes 180, it

has to force Netherland 155 or below. If Pakistan scores 150, Netherland has to be forced

below 125. Any margin below 25 runs and Netherland goes through the next round.

If netherland batting first Pakistan has to reach Netherland score before end of 20 overs as

follows to go to next round.

If Netherland scores 200 Pakistan has to reach this in 17.3 overs
If Netherland scores 190 Pakistan has to reach this in 17.3 overs
If Netherland scores 180 Pakistan has to reach this in 17.3 overs
If Netherland scores 170 Pakistan has to reach this in 17 overs
If Netherland scores 160 Pakistan has to reach this in 16.4 overs
If Netherland scores 150 Pakistan has to reach this in 16.4 overs

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England crush pakistan by 48 runs to jump to a second step and becomes the first team who confirm the berth. Pakistan won the toss and elected to field first, England start was not good. Ravi Bopara was brilliantly caught by Shoaib malik but later on Pakistan fielding was pathetic which allowed England to post a huge toptal of 185 in which Kevin Peterson was the star batsman for England side. Pakistan dropped four catches along with few miss fieldings in a few over match.

Pakistan batting was never able to follow that big total on a bouncy pitch. Non of the batsman impress and posed danger on opponent. They succumb to defeat by 48 runs which is a big margin win and they will have to struggle for their survival in a next match with Netherlands.

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India thrashed Bangladesh by 25 runs in her first Twenty20 world cup match. The Indian captain won the toss and elected to bat first. This decision really surprise the cricket pundits but Dhoni prooved that his approach is in correct direction. The matches which has been played sofar, mostly the teams which batted second win the matches but in case of India and Bangladesh it happened reverse.

Earlier Indian opener started very well and gave a good partnership stand, in the middle overs the speed of runs went slow but later few gigantic knocks from Youvraj and Irfan Pathan put India into a commanding position. Bangladesh batsmen tried hard to chase that score but failed because the wickets tumble frequently and they were 25 runs short at the end of match. Bangladesh needed one good partnership which never happened and the match went away from their hands.

The turning pont of this match was the third over where Yousaf pathan was introduced and one of the commentator commented this move as bet. The bet favors Dhoni and Tamin Iqbal the danger man was out after hitting a boundry. After that the wickets fell in close intervals and India won the match with flying colors.

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The rain affected match between Newzealand and Scotland was reduce to 7 overs. Scotland posted a challenging 89 score on the board. Earlier the cricket pundit thought there will be another upset of twenty20 world cup after the defeat of England from Netherlands.

Newzealand hitters wrap up the match in 6 overs by scoring an average of 15 runs per over. Earlier Scotland batted accordingly and posted huge score at an average of 12.71 hich can be considered as challenging in even 1 over match. However thanks to all three top Kiwi batsmen who contributed in this victory.

The short overs match also makes the Scotland difficulties more due to run average. They are -2.2 while Nezealand enjoying +2.2 which make them stronger  in standing.

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Andrew symmond the T20 specialist a powerful hitter, active fielder and reliable bowler is out of Australian squad. It seams like one disc of backbone is taken out. Australia will definitely suffer from this blow. 

Andrew Symmond was sent back to his country after senior players meeting. He was found of breaching the rules and regulation of the team. He again was found in consuming alcohol more than the moderate quantity. The cricket lover will miss his action.

Previously he was also banned for couple of months due to his alcohol consumption habit and this time again he did the same act. I think he needs a proper counselling to get rid of this habit. However it is a big loss to Australian squad and definitely a gap has been created in Australin squad and now the team does not look balance in all three departments of fielding, batting and bowling.

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