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- Oct 2, 2004
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"Have got to keep watching over Umar’s shoulders all the time or he tends to wander" : Mickey Arthur
PakPassion.net : You had a chance to see Umar Akmal up close during the recently concluded Limited-Overs series against the West Indies. What are your impressions of him as a player?
Mickey Arthur : First and foremost, I will say that Umar Akmal is a fantastic player. I feel that Umar Akmal plays the brand of cricket that we want to play in One-Dayers and Twenty20 cricket. He is the type of guy who can come in and take the game by the scruff of the neck and get a forty in twenty-five balls. We didn’t have guys in that position before. So, I think he can play. However, he like every other player knows that there are standards to be adhered to. One must conform to those standards or you won’t get another chance. In my first dealings with Umar Akmal when he came into our setup recently I found that he trained hard and well. Yes, you have got to keep watching over Umar’s shoulders all the time or he tends to wander a little bit, but he showed everything during that time that I wanted to see from a Pakistan player. I do have a slight regret, if you can call that, and this applies to Umar and Mohammad Rizwan as well. It is that we saw Umar at number five in the IT20s and Rizwan at number six in ODIs but because we played so well in those games, we didn’t get to see them under pressure or they didn’t get a proper opportunity. That’s all good and I am not complaining as such but I would have liked to see them play as that would have helped in push their careers on a bit.
- See more at: http://www.pakpassion.net/ppforum/s...zones-quot-Mickey-Arthur#sthash.ocpycPxS.dpuf
Excellent assessment of Umar Akmal but this bit
"He is the type of guy who can come in and take the game by the scruff of the neck and get a forty in twenty-five balls. We didn’t have guys in that position before."
If I was Umar Akmal, I would have a spring in my step.
PakPassion.net : You had a chance to see Umar Akmal up close during the recently concluded Limited-Overs series against the West Indies. What are your impressions of him as a player?
Mickey Arthur : First and foremost, I will say that Umar Akmal is a fantastic player. I feel that Umar Akmal plays the brand of cricket that we want to play in One-Dayers and Twenty20 cricket. He is the type of guy who can come in and take the game by the scruff of the neck and get a forty in twenty-five balls. We didn’t have guys in that position before. So, I think he can play. However, he like every other player knows that there are standards to be adhered to. One must conform to those standards or you won’t get another chance. In my first dealings with Umar Akmal when he came into our setup recently I found that he trained hard and well. Yes, you have got to keep watching over Umar’s shoulders all the time or he tends to wander a little bit, but he showed everything during that time that I wanted to see from a Pakistan player. I do have a slight regret, if you can call that, and this applies to Umar and Mohammad Rizwan as well. It is that we saw Umar at number five in the IT20s and Rizwan at number six in ODIs but because we played so well in those games, we didn’t get to see them under pressure or they didn’t get a proper opportunity. That’s all good and I am not complaining as such but I would have liked to see them play as that would have helped in push their careers on a bit.
- See more at: http://www.pakpassion.net/ppforum/s...zones-quot-Mickey-Arthur#sthash.ocpycPxS.dpuf
Excellent assessment of Umar Akmal but this bit
"He is the type of guy who can come in and take the game by the scruff of the neck and get a forty in twenty-five balls. We didn’t have guys in that position before."
If I was Umar Akmal, I would have a spring in my step.
