Mohammad Amir - From Lord's to Lord's

Pakistan has over the years produced a lot of great fast bowlers like Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, and Shoaib Akhtar. Akram is perhaps the greatest left-arm fast bowler in the history of the game. While majority in Pakistan and around the world thought Wasim Akram was irreplaceable. It was then that they unearthed this enormously talented young fast bowler Mohammad Amir.

Amir made his debut at the young age of 17 years. At 17, he took the world by storm terrorizing the opposition batsmen with his pace and swing. He is the youngest bowler to account for 50 wickets in Test cricket. He did so when he was 18 years of age. The left-armer was one of the most underrated players when Pakistan won the ICC T20 World Cup 2009. He picked six wickets in seven matches with all of his wickets coming in the opening spell. As a bowler, he was always compared to the legendary Wasim Akram and he enjoyed the comparison.

He is a tall bowler who can swing the bowl both ways at a spicy pace. Mohammad Amir constantly bowls over 140 kmph with his fastest being 152kmph. He also has the traditional Pakistani art of reverse swinging the ball. He also has a really good yorker and the variation, the slow ball in his armory.

When everything was going well for this wonder kid he dipped himself in the spot-fixing puddle by deliberately bowling no-balls against England in the Lord’s Test of 2010. Amir accepted the charges and was subsequently banned from the game for five years. This was the lowest point in his career. A potentially legendary career was met with a stumbling block. The then 19-year-old Amir not only lost his confidence but also his pride and became a symbol of anger among the fans.

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But as they say, champions never give up. He has shown a lot of courage, determination and will by making a comeback to international cricket. Since his return, he has never put a foot wrong. From being an embarrassment Amir has been successful in becoming the spearhead of his country’s bowling lineup. He has grabbed two hat-tricks after coming back one each in the BPL and PSL.

In the Asia Cup T20, in a match against India, Pakistan was fizzled out for just 83. While it appeared the paltry total of 83 won’t challenge the Indian batting lineup Amir produced an unbelievable opening spell of 2-0-3-3. He ended the game with figures of 4-0-16-3 and it earned lot of praise from former players including his idol Wasim Akram. He had a decent World T20 2016 where he picked 3 wickets in four matches and was Pakistan’s best bowler. In fact arguably, the world’s best batsman Virat Kohli praised his efforts and gifted him a bat.

Recently when Amir returned to England for the Test series against the home team he was expected to get a hostile reception from the English crowd. But he silenced the crowd by taking three wickets in a practice game against Somerset. After all this, he is just 24 and Mohammad Amir has a long international career ahead of him and can possibly emulate the great Wasim Akram and write his name in the history of the game. His brief career tells us the importance of a second chance. Will he make it count and do what everyone expects him to do? Only time will tell.

Written by Ashwin Thirumurthy