Indifferent start to Wasim's mission (27 June 1999)

27 June 1999

Indifferent start to Wasim's mission

Rob Steen

The debutant rolled up 15 minutes late, stepped unhurriedly from a Mediterranean blue Porsche in his lime green shirt and was escorted to the dressing room by a pair of mean-looking minders who appeared to have come hot-foot from auditioning a role in Men In Black II. Quite what SF Barnes, Smethwick Cricket Club's most celebrated old boy, would have made of it all, one shudders to think.

A week ago Wasim Akram was preparing to lead Pakistan into the World Cup final. Given his side's dismal fate, and the acrimony that ensued, yesterday's Birmingham League fixture against West Bromwich Dartmouth was less of a culture shock than a refuge.

While Wasim has spent the last few days re-acquainting himself with his family in Altrincham, pausing only to fulfil his obligations for Channel 4 in the commentary box at Taunton on Friday, nine of his returning countrymen were greeted at Lahore airport with a fuselade of rotten eggs, a horde of burning effigies astride donkeys and accusations of gross treachery.

Amid allegations that they had 'sold' the final, Nawaz Sharif, the prime minister, has ordered an inquiry, though whether this was his way of deflecting attention from his own financial misdeeds remains a moot point.

Judge Qayuum's much-delayed official report into bribery and match-fixing, in which Wasim has been incriminated, has been held back yet again, until next month. Which may partly have accounted for his air of serenity.

Then again, when your home has been torched and your father kidnapped in the wake of another perceived cricketing calamity, as happened after the 1996 World Cup, sang froid comes easy.

Indeed, as the media clustered round and boys in replica Pakistan shirts beseeched Wasim to inscribe their bats, it was clear that, in his second home at least, his status remains undimmed. Hence the reported £20,000 salary (plus chairman's Porsche) rustled up by a consortium of local Asian businessmen for what may amount to little more than half a dozen outings.

The anticipated 1,000-plus crowd - cited by league officials as justification for Smethwick's failure to secure their quarry's formal registration - bore a closer resemblance to 300. It was approaching 3.15pm by the time that he wended his way to the middle, chaperoned by cameramen and cutting a rather pallid figure in his whites.

After a couple of sighters he pulled his fifth ball for six and eased the next through mid-off for four, the sense of release tangible. Then, abruptly, he was gone, bowled by Warwickshire's Mark Wagh.

That his conqueror pronounces his name the same way as the Australian twins accentuated the humility.

Not that the irony stopped there. Wasim may or may not be aware that among the many classy acts he has to follow is Steve Waugh, who averaged 130 as Smethwick's professional before establishing himself as a Test player. Ignorance, in the circumstances, would probably have been bliss.

Yet much as this constituted an entirely unnecessary reminder of the Lord's debacle, it was wholly irrelevant. Even though Smethwick were nearly relegated last season, Wasim's function, after all, is less that of match winner than missionary.

A glance at the Smethwick team sheet highlighted the cause. Of the five members on county books, all Birmingham-born Asians, four were rejected by Warwickshire and forced to seek recognition at Worcestershire. The fifth, Kaiser Shah, has been on retainer at Edgbaston for quite some time without a contract being in the offing.

Wasim's chief duty is to coach and enthuse, to persuade Birmingham's Asian youths that the wall against which they have been banging their heads is not insuperable. "We are hoping for a trickle-down effect," said Raj Khan, a local teacher, stalwart of the Smethwick club and Pakistan's assistant manager during the World Cup. "We hope Wasim will have an impact on all inner-city kids in the area who feel they have not been recognised."

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)