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- Oct 2, 2004
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Many thanks to [MENTION=139664]street cricketer[/MENTION] for his excellent answers.
PakPassion.net: Why the name street cricketer?
street cricketer: Honestly it was just something that came up in my mind when I was thinking of usernames. I played a lot of street cricket in the streets of Chennai growing up, where vehicles used to be parked on either side of the road and you get out if you hit the ball into the apartments (as the apartment aunty will return the tennis ball after severing it into two halves with a warm smile). As a result of this, the only shot in my book was the straight drive. So, I thought I had to keep a username that well reflects my cricketing skills than pump up my own tires with something like "Test champion" or "Pace demon", which I certainly was not. I suppose street cricketer is the desi version of the grade cricketer
PakPassion.net: Is India the best Test team ever?
street cricketer: I do think it is yeah. It has been wonderful to watch their growth from a bunch of youngsters to not just the best team in the current era but the best...Nah, I'm just kidding. I tried answering the question with the same seriousness the question was asked. The 80’s Windies and the late 90’s/early 2000’s Aussies are comfortably the GOAT Test teams in Test cricket history. If you calculate the decade wise W/L ratio of each decade from 70s, there are two clear outliers - Windies in 80’s and Australia in ‘00s. Everyone else is only competing for the other spots in Test cricket history.
PakPassion.net: Players you had high hopes for from Pakistan.
street cricketer: I admired two cricketers from Pakistan very much. I thought Salman Butt was a proper organised batsman, who will go on to have a great career for Pakistan, but his downfall was sad to see in a way similar to Cronje, because I think he has a great cricket brain. In an alternate universe, if he had not ventured into fixing, he could have gone on to become one of the most successful Test captains in Pakistan's history, but he threw away his own future.
Second player I had a huge liking towards was Mohammad Sami. I simply loved his action, so much so that my bowling action in street cricket was entirely copied from his (it's another thing I trundled with that action). I remember him having a good series against India initially and he used to be rapid. But sadly, he never lived up to the initial promise he showed in his career. There are a few cricketers I have thought would go on to become superstars for their countries like the former two, Shaun Marsh and Callum Ferguson for Australia, but they turned out to be disappointments.
PakPassion.net: Players you would change or get rid of in the Indian setup right now?
street cricketer: Well there are not a lot I'll change in the Test setup. There is a young pacer named Ishan Porel though, who plays for Bengal, who I would love to add to the Test squad. Shivam Mavi and Kamlesh Nagarkoti hogged all the limelight in their successful U19 WC win in 2018, but I think Porel has the greatest potential among the three in Test cricket. He's not as quick as the former two, but he's tall and is accurate, sort of like Morne Morkel and I think he'll have a great future in Test cricket. Apart from Porel, I would like to see Prasidh Krishna of Karnataka getting more chances for India A as I think he will feature in the next gen Indian teams across formats.
I don't rate our LOI teams as high as I rate our Test team though. I think we don't have potent strike bowlers in T20 or ODI cricket and apart from Bumrah, everyone else can be carted around. There's a Tamil Nadu spinner called Sai Kishore who I think should get a look in the India A setup in LOI squad, he's a very economical left arm spinner and has been doing well for TN for some time now, but unfortunately gets consistently benched by CSK in the IPL. It's home bias yes, but I would also love to have Tamil Nadu middle order hitter Shah Rukh Khan getting a look into the India A setup. I think he can be the middle order hitter we lack as he can hit the ball a long way. I don't rate Krunal Pandya as he can't play the short ball if his life depended on it, so I wouldn't mind him getting the axe from the LOI squad until he corrects his short ball weakness.
PakPassion.net: Why do you think there aren't many elite cricketers produced from Tamil Nadu? Except for Ashwin, players like Vijay, Karthik and even Kris Srikanth are good but not elite. How come?
street cricketer: The one thing I have noted with Tamil Nadu players is that they're great players in domestic cricket - like Abhinav Mukund, Dinesh Karthik, etc. But there's that aggression and fighting ability that I see them lacking that batsmen from say Mumbai or Delhi have. And that is that factor that stops them from advancing to the next level in international cricket. We are great in producing the Graeme Hicks, Mark Ramprakashs and Wasim Jaffers of domestic cricket. But you need the fighting ability, that aggression that players like Kohli, Pant from Delhi or Shaw, Kishan from Mumbai have which TN players lack. Ashwin was actually the one who bucked the trend and is a quite aggressive player despite being a spinner and it's why he's the only player from TN who features consistently in Indian teams.
Cricket in India was largely an upper class and upper caste sport in the past, and that was the same case in TN. Times have changed now though and players of all caste and religion get to play for TN these days, but it's still an upper/upper middle-class sport I feel in Tamil Nadu. However, it's great to see players like Natarajan emerging from a very humble background from the most interior of villages, and so there's a change. It's simple mathematics. We have a 1.4 billion population, but we use only a fraction of that population in cricket. But as you tap more and more into your population, when playing cricket is increasingly seen as an affordable career option for the lower middle classes or even the lower classes, only then you'll tap into the full potential of your demographic, but that's the case for all states.
PakPassion.net: Do you think Pakistan will manage to beat India in Test and ODI rankings under Babar Azam?
street cricketer: India are probably at their peak in Test cricket now, but like every great team at their peak, the only way next is a decline, especially if there's a bad transition. The Indian team faced that in the early 2010s, Australia faced that after McGrath, Warne and later Ponting retired and even the Saffer team has not fully recovered after its decline. It's a cycle - you have a young inexperienced team, then the ascent, the peak, then the decline, then the cycle repeats. Pakistan are probably now in the ascent phase and India are probably on the way to descent in a year or two. So yes, there is a chance for Pakistan to overtake India provided they reach their peak and don't remain in an extended middling limbo like the Saffer and English teams are in a way after the decline of their respective great teams. But currently, India are very strong in Test cricket and if they handle the transition better than they did in the early 2010s when the consecutive 4-0 debacles happened, India might stay up.
I don't really care about ODI rankings though, rankings do not matter in LOI formats, trophies do, and Pakistan have a good chance of winning the next World cup in India as the conditions should suit them to the tee. For the upcoming world T20 in Australia though, I think they need to shuffle their opening and have Babar at 3, with Rizwan and Fakhar as openers. You need to bat at a higher tempo on the roads in Australia, which might not be necessary in the UAE. Pakistan have a better T20/ODI team than their Test team and therefore have more chances of overtaking India in LOI rankings than Test cricket in my opinion.
PakPassion.net: What is your opinion on the future of Indian Test batting?
street cricketer: I think it's pretty bright. I'm going to talk about the Test batting here - I think Shaw, as aggressive a player he is, cannot survive as an opener in Test cricket. He can bash it around in LoI cricket or even in the subcontinent in Test cricket, but his technique will get exposed outside asia as an opener. I think his best place, if he has to play, is at no.5 in Test cricket. I reckon young Yashasvi Jaiswal has good potential to become a Test opener. He is very organised and I was very impressed with his technique in the U19 WC. Gaikwad can be the no.3, someone who I think has got immense potential and Gill will occupy Kohli's position at 4. Iyer will probably be the no.5 with Pant at 6. So, the future Test batting will look something like this:
KL Rahul
Yashasvi Jaiswal
Ruturaj Gaikwad
Shubman Gill
Shreyas Iyer
Rishabh Pant
That's a pretty solid top 6. Obviously, there are guys like Panchal, Easwaran always in the fringes and they could break into this team as well
PakPassion.net: Will Rahul Dravid be a success as Indian coach?
street cricketer:I am someone who doesn't rate the role of a coach in cricket greatly. They can at best formulate plans for the opposition, correct minor chinks in technique of players but cricket coaches themselves cannot influence cricket results to a great extent. Rahul Dravid's biggest challenge will be to act as a good man manager and managing the apparent ego tussle between Kohli and Rohit, so that it doesn't negatively impact the team environment. Dravid's personality is similar to someone like Gary Kirsten or John Wright, both of whom had successful stints as Indian coaches, so I think he'll do just fine as long as he manages the team well. Dravid is someone who'll operate from the background and not be upfront like Kumble, so I think he'll get on fine with Kohli and Rohit.
PakPassion.net: Are you in favor of resumption of Indo-Pak bilateral cricket?
street cricketer: Not just in cricket, I think India and Pakistan need to get along with each other as mature countries. They cannot change their neighbours no matter how much they wish, so both should just learn to live with each other. I think the fact that our soldiers are sniping each other’s heads off across the LOC in the 21st century when other developed nations like US & Canada, UK & France or Australia & NZ share cordial relations with each other is a sad indictment on the state of affairs in the subcontinent. I know there's the obvious religious factor at play here, but Bangladeshi tourists form the largest proportion of all tourist arrivals to India, accounting for nearly 25% each year. I have seen many Bangladeshi citizens travelling to as far down as Chennai and Vellore for health consultancy, and they travel all over India, particularly West Bengal for tourism while Indian vloggers regularly visit Dhaka and Chittagong for their tourism vlogs. And Bangladesh was once part of Pakistan, the "arch enemy" state of Indistreet cricketer:[/B]
It's just sad that India and Pakistan cannot share the same relations due to the obvious political issues between the two. Imagine if Indian tourists can backpack in the beautiful scenic valleys of Gilgit or Swat and if Pakistani tourists can chill in the houseboats of the serene tropical backwaters of Kerala or the vibrant beaches of Goa with little hindrances. But that can only happen when both countries stop seeing each other as enemies and there's of course the obvious elephant in the room - the Kashmir dispute. So yes, I'm all for India and Pakistan behaving like 90% of the mature countries in the world, but until the political issues are resolved, it's hard to see that happening. What I said about both countries becoming open to each other will obviously happen one day, it's just that it's hard to see it happening anytime soon though. Perhaps when we are in our advanced ages maybe.
PakPassion.net: Which Pakistani cricketers do you want to see in the IPL?
street cricketer: Pakistani cricketers will add a lot of colour to the IPL, I know it's odd but the political rivalry will add a lot to the mysticism factor. Babar and Rizwan are obviously excellent batsmen, both of whom will fetch a lot of money in the auctions. But the one superstar who will fetch the most money would be Shaheen Shah Afridi. Batsmen and spinners are in abundance in Indian domestic cricket and therefore even relatively good overseas batsmen, or spinners can get unsold. But pacers and pace bowling all-rounders who are lower order hitters (Stokes, Russell, etc.) are the most valuable commodity in the IPL and therefore Shaheen will fetch a huge sum in the auction if he had been playing. He'll be a superstar in the IPL like Malinga was. I would love to see Shadab playing and Hasan Ali can be very sought after too because he can hit sixes as a fast bowler. Asif Ali also is making a name for himself as a hitter, so I can see him getting sold as well.
PakPassion.net: What are the top five Test bowling spells of your lifetime?
street cricketer: I'm obviously talking purely about the spells I have watched live, and these are not necessarily the best ever bowling spells. In no particular order:
1. Dale Steyn 7/51 v India at Nagpur, 2010 - When Steyn defied the conditions to run through India on a flat subcontinental wicket.
2. Mitchell Johnson 7/68 v South Africa at Centurion, 2014 - The ultimate peak of Johnson when he eviscerated a Saffer team that was the undisputed no.1 team in its own home, getting a 12fer for the match. Sheer violence.
3. Kumble 10/74 v Pakistan at Delhi, 1999 - Even if you dispute a wicket or two, a 9fer or an 8fer against Pakistan who are great players of spin is no mean feat. One of my earliest cricket watching memories.
4. Hazlewood 5/8 & Cummins 4/21 v India at Adelaide, 2020 - Usually I'd be angry after every Indian collapse in Test cricket. Not that day though, even as India got skittled for 36, because I just didn't see any major mistakes from Indian batsmen. Was just unplayable bowling by the duo after India had dominated the majority of the match.
5. Broad 8/15 v Australia at Nottingham, 2015 - Broad's hands over his mouth reaction was exactly my reaction while watching that spell as Australia got skittled for 60. Anderson of course is the maestro, but Broad when he's in the zone can be more unplayable than facing Jimmy Anderson.
Asif's 4/78 v India at Karachi, 2006 vs the Indian fab 4 at its peak, Bumrah's 6/33 in the 2018 Boxing Day test on a flat road, Ashwin 3/35 on a greenish wicket bowling first in the 2020 boxing day test given the context of the series, Dale Steyn's epic battle with Tendulkar at Cape Town in 2010 which the umpires Ian Gould and Taufel remarked that they'd pay to watch, all missed the cut by a close whisker.
PakPassion.net: Who do you think is the next big thing in Indian cricket in terms of batting?
street cricketer: Shubman Gill of course is the next in line of Indian stalwarts like Gavaskar, Tendulkar and Kohli. But if Gill was an obvious answer, I think Ruturaj Gaikwad has great potential to be the next big Indian superstar across all formats. Shaw, Gill and Gaikwad will form the backbone of the Indian ODI setup in the future.
PakPassion.net: Will Shaheen Shah Afridi be Pakistan’s greatest fast-bowler by the end of his career?
street cricketer: I think I have already said the same in this forum. He has the potential to become the best bowler in Pakistan's history after the great Wasim (I'm partial to Wasim because he's my favourite Pakistani player ever and also because Wasim was a wizard who is hard to surpass). Coming to Shaheen, fast bowling generally requires a few attributes that make a pacer lethal. Many fast bowlers specialise in particular attributes - say Starc in sheer pace and swing, Anderson/Boult/Southee in swing and seam movement, Bumrah/Hazlewood in immaculate accuracy at pace, Jamieson (or Morkel in past) in their tall physique to generate lift and bounce off good length. Shaheen may not be the best in each of these attributes, but he ticks the most boxes which is very hard to come across as a fast bowler.
He has the height to generate disconcerting bounce and lift, he is rapid, he swings the ball at pace and his yorkers and bouncers are immaculate. It's why I think he's the hottest property right now in LoI cricket, something like Starc was around 6-7 years ago. Of course, he does have room for improvement. He needs to learn to move the ball away from the right hander, he needs to learn to be boringly consistent with line and length to be successful in Test cricket and things like that. But all that will come with experience, and you have to remember he's just 21. If he remains humble and doesn't do something stupid like Amir or Asif, he can become the premier fast bowler in world cricket in a few years’ time, someone like Pat Cummins today in Test cricket.
PakPassion.net: Why the name street cricketer?
street cricketer: Honestly it was just something that came up in my mind when I was thinking of usernames. I played a lot of street cricket in the streets of Chennai growing up, where vehicles used to be parked on either side of the road and you get out if you hit the ball into the apartments (as the apartment aunty will return the tennis ball after severing it into two halves with a warm smile). As a result of this, the only shot in my book was the straight drive. So, I thought I had to keep a username that well reflects my cricketing skills than pump up my own tires with something like "Test champion" or "Pace demon", which I certainly was not. I suppose street cricketer is the desi version of the grade cricketer
PakPassion.net: Is India the best Test team ever?
street cricketer: I do think it is yeah. It has been wonderful to watch their growth from a bunch of youngsters to not just the best team in the current era but the best...Nah, I'm just kidding. I tried answering the question with the same seriousness the question was asked. The 80’s Windies and the late 90’s/early 2000’s Aussies are comfortably the GOAT Test teams in Test cricket history. If you calculate the decade wise W/L ratio of each decade from 70s, there are two clear outliers - Windies in 80’s and Australia in ‘00s. Everyone else is only competing for the other spots in Test cricket history.
PakPassion.net: Players you had high hopes for from Pakistan.
street cricketer: I admired two cricketers from Pakistan very much. I thought Salman Butt was a proper organised batsman, who will go on to have a great career for Pakistan, but his downfall was sad to see in a way similar to Cronje, because I think he has a great cricket brain. In an alternate universe, if he had not ventured into fixing, he could have gone on to become one of the most successful Test captains in Pakistan's history, but he threw away his own future.
Second player I had a huge liking towards was Mohammad Sami. I simply loved his action, so much so that my bowling action in street cricket was entirely copied from his (it's another thing I trundled with that action). I remember him having a good series against India initially and he used to be rapid. But sadly, he never lived up to the initial promise he showed in his career. There are a few cricketers I have thought would go on to become superstars for their countries like the former two, Shaun Marsh and Callum Ferguson for Australia, but they turned out to be disappointments.
PakPassion.net: Players you would change or get rid of in the Indian setup right now?
street cricketer: Well there are not a lot I'll change in the Test setup. There is a young pacer named Ishan Porel though, who plays for Bengal, who I would love to add to the Test squad. Shivam Mavi and Kamlesh Nagarkoti hogged all the limelight in their successful U19 WC win in 2018, but I think Porel has the greatest potential among the three in Test cricket. He's not as quick as the former two, but he's tall and is accurate, sort of like Morne Morkel and I think he'll have a great future in Test cricket. Apart from Porel, I would like to see Prasidh Krishna of Karnataka getting more chances for India A as I think he will feature in the next gen Indian teams across formats.
I don't rate our LOI teams as high as I rate our Test team though. I think we don't have potent strike bowlers in T20 or ODI cricket and apart from Bumrah, everyone else can be carted around. There's a Tamil Nadu spinner called Sai Kishore who I think should get a look in the India A setup in LOI squad, he's a very economical left arm spinner and has been doing well for TN for some time now, but unfortunately gets consistently benched by CSK in the IPL. It's home bias yes, but I would also love to have Tamil Nadu middle order hitter Shah Rukh Khan getting a look into the India A setup. I think he can be the middle order hitter we lack as he can hit the ball a long way. I don't rate Krunal Pandya as he can't play the short ball if his life depended on it, so I wouldn't mind him getting the axe from the LOI squad until he corrects his short ball weakness.
PakPassion.net: Why do you think there aren't many elite cricketers produced from Tamil Nadu? Except for Ashwin, players like Vijay, Karthik and even Kris Srikanth are good but not elite. How come?
street cricketer: The one thing I have noted with Tamil Nadu players is that they're great players in domestic cricket - like Abhinav Mukund, Dinesh Karthik, etc. But there's that aggression and fighting ability that I see them lacking that batsmen from say Mumbai or Delhi have. And that is that factor that stops them from advancing to the next level in international cricket. We are great in producing the Graeme Hicks, Mark Ramprakashs and Wasim Jaffers of domestic cricket. But you need the fighting ability, that aggression that players like Kohli, Pant from Delhi or Shaw, Kishan from Mumbai have which TN players lack. Ashwin was actually the one who bucked the trend and is a quite aggressive player despite being a spinner and it's why he's the only player from TN who features consistently in Indian teams.
Cricket in India was largely an upper class and upper caste sport in the past, and that was the same case in TN. Times have changed now though and players of all caste and religion get to play for TN these days, but it's still an upper/upper middle-class sport I feel in Tamil Nadu. However, it's great to see players like Natarajan emerging from a very humble background from the most interior of villages, and so there's a change. It's simple mathematics. We have a 1.4 billion population, but we use only a fraction of that population in cricket. But as you tap more and more into your population, when playing cricket is increasingly seen as an affordable career option for the lower middle classes or even the lower classes, only then you'll tap into the full potential of your demographic, but that's the case for all states.
PakPassion.net: Do you think Pakistan will manage to beat India in Test and ODI rankings under Babar Azam?
street cricketer: India are probably at their peak in Test cricket now, but like every great team at their peak, the only way next is a decline, especially if there's a bad transition. The Indian team faced that in the early 2010s, Australia faced that after McGrath, Warne and later Ponting retired and even the Saffer team has not fully recovered after its decline. It's a cycle - you have a young inexperienced team, then the ascent, the peak, then the decline, then the cycle repeats. Pakistan are probably now in the ascent phase and India are probably on the way to descent in a year or two. So yes, there is a chance for Pakistan to overtake India provided they reach their peak and don't remain in an extended middling limbo like the Saffer and English teams are in a way after the decline of their respective great teams. But currently, India are very strong in Test cricket and if they handle the transition better than they did in the early 2010s when the consecutive 4-0 debacles happened, India might stay up.
I don't really care about ODI rankings though, rankings do not matter in LOI formats, trophies do, and Pakistan have a good chance of winning the next World cup in India as the conditions should suit them to the tee. For the upcoming world T20 in Australia though, I think they need to shuffle their opening and have Babar at 3, with Rizwan and Fakhar as openers. You need to bat at a higher tempo on the roads in Australia, which might not be necessary in the UAE. Pakistan have a better T20/ODI team than their Test team and therefore have more chances of overtaking India in LOI rankings than Test cricket in my opinion.
PakPassion.net: What is your opinion on the future of Indian Test batting?
street cricketer: I think it's pretty bright. I'm going to talk about the Test batting here - I think Shaw, as aggressive a player he is, cannot survive as an opener in Test cricket. He can bash it around in LoI cricket or even in the subcontinent in Test cricket, but his technique will get exposed outside asia as an opener. I think his best place, if he has to play, is at no.5 in Test cricket. I reckon young Yashasvi Jaiswal has good potential to become a Test opener. He is very organised and I was very impressed with his technique in the U19 WC. Gaikwad can be the no.3, someone who I think has got immense potential and Gill will occupy Kohli's position at 4. Iyer will probably be the no.5 with Pant at 6. So, the future Test batting will look something like this:
KL Rahul
Yashasvi Jaiswal
Ruturaj Gaikwad
Shubman Gill
Shreyas Iyer
Rishabh Pant
That's a pretty solid top 6. Obviously, there are guys like Panchal, Easwaran always in the fringes and they could break into this team as well
PakPassion.net: Will Rahul Dravid be a success as Indian coach?
street cricketer:I am someone who doesn't rate the role of a coach in cricket greatly. They can at best formulate plans for the opposition, correct minor chinks in technique of players but cricket coaches themselves cannot influence cricket results to a great extent. Rahul Dravid's biggest challenge will be to act as a good man manager and managing the apparent ego tussle between Kohli and Rohit, so that it doesn't negatively impact the team environment. Dravid's personality is similar to someone like Gary Kirsten or John Wright, both of whom had successful stints as Indian coaches, so I think he'll do just fine as long as he manages the team well. Dravid is someone who'll operate from the background and not be upfront like Kumble, so I think he'll get on fine with Kohli and Rohit.
PakPassion.net: Are you in favor of resumption of Indo-Pak bilateral cricket?
street cricketer: Not just in cricket, I think India and Pakistan need to get along with each other as mature countries. They cannot change their neighbours no matter how much they wish, so both should just learn to live with each other. I think the fact that our soldiers are sniping each other’s heads off across the LOC in the 21st century when other developed nations like US & Canada, UK & France or Australia & NZ share cordial relations with each other is a sad indictment on the state of affairs in the subcontinent. I know there's the obvious religious factor at play here, but Bangladeshi tourists form the largest proportion of all tourist arrivals to India, accounting for nearly 25% each year. I have seen many Bangladeshi citizens travelling to as far down as Chennai and Vellore for health consultancy, and they travel all over India, particularly West Bengal for tourism while Indian vloggers regularly visit Dhaka and Chittagong for their tourism vlogs. And Bangladesh was once part of Pakistan, the "arch enemy" state of Indistreet cricketer:[/B]
It's just sad that India and Pakistan cannot share the same relations due to the obvious political issues between the two. Imagine if Indian tourists can backpack in the beautiful scenic valleys of Gilgit or Swat and if Pakistani tourists can chill in the houseboats of the serene tropical backwaters of Kerala or the vibrant beaches of Goa with little hindrances. But that can only happen when both countries stop seeing each other as enemies and there's of course the obvious elephant in the room - the Kashmir dispute. So yes, I'm all for India and Pakistan behaving like 90% of the mature countries in the world, but until the political issues are resolved, it's hard to see that happening. What I said about both countries becoming open to each other will obviously happen one day, it's just that it's hard to see it happening anytime soon though. Perhaps when we are in our advanced ages maybe.
PakPassion.net: Which Pakistani cricketers do you want to see in the IPL?
street cricketer: Pakistani cricketers will add a lot of colour to the IPL, I know it's odd but the political rivalry will add a lot to the mysticism factor. Babar and Rizwan are obviously excellent batsmen, both of whom will fetch a lot of money in the auctions. But the one superstar who will fetch the most money would be Shaheen Shah Afridi. Batsmen and spinners are in abundance in Indian domestic cricket and therefore even relatively good overseas batsmen, or spinners can get unsold. But pacers and pace bowling all-rounders who are lower order hitters (Stokes, Russell, etc.) are the most valuable commodity in the IPL and therefore Shaheen will fetch a huge sum in the auction if he had been playing. He'll be a superstar in the IPL like Malinga was. I would love to see Shadab playing and Hasan Ali can be very sought after too because he can hit sixes as a fast bowler. Asif Ali also is making a name for himself as a hitter, so I can see him getting sold as well.
PakPassion.net: What are the top five Test bowling spells of your lifetime?
street cricketer: I'm obviously talking purely about the spells I have watched live, and these are not necessarily the best ever bowling spells. In no particular order:
1. Dale Steyn 7/51 v India at Nagpur, 2010 - When Steyn defied the conditions to run through India on a flat subcontinental wicket.
2. Mitchell Johnson 7/68 v South Africa at Centurion, 2014 - The ultimate peak of Johnson when he eviscerated a Saffer team that was the undisputed no.1 team in its own home, getting a 12fer for the match. Sheer violence.
3. Kumble 10/74 v Pakistan at Delhi, 1999 - Even if you dispute a wicket or two, a 9fer or an 8fer against Pakistan who are great players of spin is no mean feat. One of my earliest cricket watching memories.
4. Hazlewood 5/8 & Cummins 4/21 v India at Adelaide, 2020 - Usually I'd be angry after every Indian collapse in Test cricket. Not that day though, even as India got skittled for 36, because I just didn't see any major mistakes from Indian batsmen. Was just unplayable bowling by the duo after India had dominated the majority of the match.
5. Broad 8/15 v Australia at Nottingham, 2015 - Broad's hands over his mouth reaction was exactly my reaction while watching that spell as Australia got skittled for 60. Anderson of course is the maestro, but Broad when he's in the zone can be more unplayable than facing Jimmy Anderson.
Asif's 4/78 v India at Karachi, 2006 vs the Indian fab 4 at its peak, Bumrah's 6/33 in the 2018 Boxing Day test on a flat road, Ashwin 3/35 on a greenish wicket bowling first in the 2020 boxing day test given the context of the series, Dale Steyn's epic battle with Tendulkar at Cape Town in 2010 which the umpires Ian Gould and Taufel remarked that they'd pay to watch, all missed the cut by a close whisker.
PakPassion.net: Who do you think is the next big thing in Indian cricket in terms of batting?
street cricketer: Shubman Gill of course is the next in line of Indian stalwarts like Gavaskar, Tendulkar and Kohli. But if Gill was an obvious answer, I think Ruturaj Gaikwad has great potential to be the next big Indian superstar across all formats. Shaw, Gill and Gaikwad will form the backbone of the Indian ODI setup in the future.
PakPassion.net: Will Shaheen Shah Afridi be Pakistan’s greatest fast-bowler by the end of his career?
street cricketer: I think I have already said the same in this forum. He has the potential to become the best bowler in Pakistan's history after the great Wasim (I'm partial to Wasim because he's my favourite Pakistani player ever and also because Wasim was a wizard who is hard to surpass). Coming to Shaheen, fast bowling generally requires a few attributes that make a pacer lethal. Many fast bowlers specialise in particular attributes - say Starc in sheer pace and swing, Anderson/Boult/Southee in swing and seam movement, Bumrah/Hazlewood in immaculate accuracy at pace, Jamieson (or Morkel in past) in their tall physique to generate lift and bounce off good length. Shaheen may not be the best in each of these attributes, but he ticks the most boxes which is very hard to come across as a fast bowler.
He has the height to generate disconcerting bounce and lift, he is rapid, he swings the ball at pace and his yorkers and bouncers are immaculate. It's why I think he's the hottest property right now in LoI cricket, something like Starc was around 6-7 years ago. Of course, he does have room for improvement. He needs to learn to move the ball away from the right hander, he needs to learn to be boringly consistent with line and length to be successful in Test cricket and things like that. But all that will come with experience, and you have to remember he's just 21. If he remains humble and doesn't do something stupid like Amir or Asif, he can become the premier fast bowler in world cricket in a few years’ time, someone like Pat Cummins today in Test cricket.
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and this interview is further evidence of that. PP is not the same without him 
