Monday, December 03, 2007

Sami in a new role

Mohammad Sami is turning out to be more successful with the bat than with the ball for Pakistan in this series.

In three innings in the series so far Sami has batted for more than seven hours and has been involved in two useful partnerships with Misbah-ul-Haq. In the first innings of Delhi Test, Misbah and Sami added 87 runs for the ninth wicket – the highest partnership for this wicket for Pakistan against India and remained unbeaten on 28 till the end. In the second innings of Delhi Test, he could contribute only 5 but more importantly defied the Indian bowlers for about an hour.

At Kolkata today he batted for nearly three hours for his 38 runs stitching a partnership of 91 runs with Misbah for the seventh wicket.

How important has been Sami for Pakistan can be gauged from the fact that once he was dismissed, the innings folded in no time. In first innings of Delhi Test, he remained unbeaten till the end. In the second innings, he was the ninth wicket to fall and innings folded just two minutes and one ball later. At Kolkata today,he was the seventh wicket to fall and last three wickets fell within 28 minutes and 32 balls.
 
Sami with the bat in the series so far
Runs Mins Balls 4s 6s
Delhi Test - 1st inns 28* 194 101 3 1
Delhi Test - 2nd inns 5 53 25 1 0
Kolkata Test - 1st inns 38 177 123 2 1