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"Mohammad Asif was the scariest bowler I faced" : Kevin Pietersen

JaDed said:
Asif and Amir above Shoaib no way.Also, Wasim was better than Imran imo could be because he was a left arm pacer.
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Agreed about amir but its debatable when comes to asif. I say they are equal, him and shoaib.
 
Alchemy said:
Agreed about amir but its debatable when comes to asif. I say they are equal, him and shoaib.
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Asif would had been great no doubt but a cricketer imo is made of a lot of qualities and aggression should be one of them.We only saw the good years of Asif you never know how it could had gone whereas Shoaib even in his later years could play the mind games better than Asif.
 
Savak said:
Over rated to be honest. Both were lucky to have played most of their games in England, NZ, Australia. On flat patta wickets like the UAE both will struggle and have struggled.
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i dont agree with that....he played two tests in lanka and got 17 wickets....his one bad series was against SA in pakistan where he had 2 wickets in 2 games.....but apart from that he performed on pattas
 
menace2society said:
Asif used his brain and attempted to work the batsman out. He would have been easily ATG Test bowler, far superior to Philander.

Look at this, takes out ABD's middle stump with an absolute beauty.

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:O :O

He was truly a magician.

Only he could bowl that "dual movement" delivery!!!

There's a video on YouTube where he dismissed Ponting off that dual movement delivery..

At first the ball would take the outswing trajectory, but then get inside movement off the seam!

BEAUTY and absolutely UNPLAYABLE by even Bradman... no one can play that.
 
Dr_Bassim said:
I would just swap Wasim for Imran.

Rest of list looks fine.

I think Imran had less talent than Wasim but more of a hard worker.

Wasim was the most talented bowler to emerge from Pakistan and could bowl 6 different deliveries in an over.

No Junaid in the rankings ? :13: .. eh...
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Yes you are right, strictly on talent
I suppose I am bringing other factors in to it like Imran defining the legacy of contemporary Pakistan fast bowling
 
menace2society said:
Agree with Doc, Wasim was one of the best bowlers in history and easily ranks no.1

Asif is the most skilled bowler we have produced in the 21st century.

He is able to deliver variation with precision and intelligence.

Have seen what the current pacers do? Irfan, Junaid and Wahab all bowl without a plan for the over.

For example in the last game against OZ, Irfan took out Finch in the first ball and pathetically released the pressure by bowling the same line. He should have gone for a rapid yorker immediately followed by a hostile bouncer. If he had the ability to swing perhaps bring the ball in unexpectantly after a couple of balls moving away from the batsman.

They just do not know what to do in an over. They don't understand creating micro pressure zones, bowl defensively to a defensive field, set by a defensive captain. They do not know the weak areas of batsman so they can target. It is just so mediocre.

Asif used his brain and attempted to work the batsman out. He would have been easily ATG Test bowler, far superior to Philander.

Look at this, takes out ABD's middle stump with an absolute beauty.

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Agree, I get biased by Imran's legacy creation of contemporary Pakistani fast bowling
 
Asif had cricketing intelligence, could make the ball talk and go both ways and make any batsmen look stupid, such a shame he threw his career the way he did, i remember playing club cricket against him in early 2000s and he look a supreme talent then.
 
JaDed said:
Asif and Amir above Shoaib no way.Also, Wasim was better than Imran imo could be because he was a left arm pacer.
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Shoaib is the least talented on that list in my view.
Waqar was effortlessly fast and more fit and more destructive
Asif was different from all of them because he did not need the express pace...he had an easy action which would allow him to bowl long spell and work batsmen over: all this talk of his potentially being useless on flat tracks is nonsense. McGrath did it with ease in India.
Aamir gets a mention because he was prodigiously talented at an early age
Imran of course defined the legacy.
And lastly only one of these bowlers was chucking
 
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Pete Rose said:
Shoaib is the least talented on that list in my view.
Waqar was effortlessly fast and more fit and more destructive
Asif was different from all of them because he did not need the express pace...he had an easy action which would allow him to bowl long spell and work batsmen over: all this talk of his potentially being useless on flat tracks is nonsense. McGrath did it with ease in India.
Aamir gets a mention because he was prodigiously talented at an early age
Imran of course defined the legacy.
And lastly only one of these bowlers was chucking
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Shoaib least talented? you got to be kidding me. :)))

You just hate him because he calls out misbah. Ah. your love story.
 
I have been saying this,we may find a bowler like Amir but would probably never be able to find one like Asif.
 
JaDed said:
Asif would had been great no doubt but a cricketer imo is made of a lot of qualities and aggression should be one of them.We only saw the good years of Asif you never know how it could had gone whereas Shoaib even in his later years could play the mind games better than Asif.
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Asif was a maestro in mind games. The way he set up batsmen was class and he definitely was aggressive but like Dhoni didnt show on his face.
 
Pete Rose said:
Shoaib is the least talented on that list in my view.
Waqar was effortlessly fast and more fit and more destructive
Asif was different from all of them because he did not need the express pace...he had an easy action which would allow him to bowl long spell and work batsmen over: all this talk of his potentially being useless on flat tracks is nonsense. McGrath did it with ease in India.
Aamir gets a mention because he was prodigiously talented at an early age
Imran of course defined the legacy.
And lastly only one of these bowlers was chucking
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Perhaps only one was chucking, but two of them were using performance-enhancing drugs......

And another of them was let off by Justice Qayyum for matchfixing because he had a "soft corner" for him.

It always nauseates me that Asif and Amir are treated as scum but Qayyum's favourite is treated as if he was not guilty, even though Qayyum made it perfectly clear in 2006 that he would have found him guilty but was, in his words, "his fan".
 
Junaids said:
Perhaps only one was chucking, but two of them were using performance-enhancing drugs......

And another of them was let off by Justice Qayyum for matchfixing because he had a "soft corner" for him.

It always nauseates me that Asif and Amir are treated as scum but Qayyum's favourite is treated as if he was not guilty, even though Qayyum made it perfectly clear in 2006 that he would have found him guilty but was, in his words, "his fan".
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Yes, but the one chucking also used PE drugs.
Back in on point, he was the least talented on that list, doesn't mean he was the least talented ever.
 
Pete Rose said:
Yes, but the one chucking also used PE drugs.
Back in on point, he was the least talented on that list, doesn't mean he was the least talented ever.
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depends on how you define talent....i think him and waqar were on the same level in terms of talent...maybe even imran.
shoaib could get conventional swing with the new ball as did waqar ( in the second half of his career), shoaib could reverse it, and so could waqar very well i might add. shoaib had an amazing short ball and i think he had great game intelligence could really out think a batsman. waqar had the added advantage of wasim at the other end. shoaib was let down by his attitude, fitness and lack of sufficient support as well as his refusal to compromise on speed and his run up. wasim, dirty as he was (fixing) was amazingly talented way more than anyone else on that list
 
"Mohammed Asif is the scariest bowler I've faced.

"I deemed him unplayable.

"The only bowler I thought 'This ain't good' when he came on.
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- excerpt from KP book
 
"The best bowler I faced was Mohammad Asif - by a country mile" : Kevin Pietersen

Was just listening to a KP interview. It was an hour long, where he discussed various topics about cricket and his career. The most interesting point for me was at the end when the interviewer asked who was the best bowler he faced. Wanted to share his answer with my fellow Pak fans here:

"The best bowler I faced was Mohammad Asif. The guy from Pakistan who got done for match-fixing and stuff. Probably not a bad thing cos he tormented a lot of batters. Just his ability to make a batsman feel like the ball was accelerating of the wicket in different directions."

Interviewer - "I thought you might have said Mitchell Johnson there."

KP - "Nah. Mohammad Asif by a country mile. If I was in good form, he made sure I wasn't in good form a couple of weeks later after playing him. And if I wasn't in good form, I definitely knew I wasn't after playing him a couple of weeks in a series."
 
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Bitter-sweet moment for me listening to it. Bitter because it's another reminder of what could have been. But sweet because this is high praise indeed. KP has faced McGrath, Warne, Murali, Steyn, Philander, Johnson, Ajmal, Herath, Ashwin etc and he rates Asif higher than them all "by a country mile".

It caught me off guard how quickly he answered it because the preceding question was "Who was the best batsman" and he had to think for a bit before giving the answer (Ponting and Kallis btw).
 
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He's said it multiple times

I remember once he was asked the question and it didn't even take him a second for him to say 'Mohammad Asif'
 
I believe he mentions it in his book as well, a shame really when we think of what could have been with Asif. He is still the best right arm seamer by a country mile in pakistan
 
I think we should move on. We can find more bowlers like him if we make changes to our cricket structure. And allow youngsters to excel.
 
Not suprised. Asif was a challenge for most batsmen with his accurate line and length.
 
Irfanullah shah can be developed into a poor Man's asif from what i have seen.
 
Always makes you wonder what could have been.Asif isn't the same now,from what I could see in the trophy final.He was good but a shadow of his past self.
 
Could have had a run of years of incredible bowling with Asif/Amir/Junaid/Ajmal/Hafeez.
 
The ball's acceleration after pitching was incredible,it was much more difficult than playing a 150kph ball without even considering the seam movment he got.
 
itsme said:
The ball's acceleration after pitching was incredible,it was much more difficult than playing a 150kph ball without even considering the seam movment he got.
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Theoretically ball cannot accelerate after pitching
 
Rayyman said:
But to the batsman it can look as such. Which is enough to deceive him.
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The only way it can 'look' faster to the batsman is if he is expecting it to be slower based on the bowler's action/arm speed but the bowler delivers it faster due to his strong wrists. Which is the case with Asif.
 
Syed1 said:
The only way it can 'look' faster to the batsman is if he is expecting it to be slower based on the bowler's action/arm speed but the bowler delivers it faster due to his strong wrists. Which is the case with Asif.
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Actually that's not why he deceived batsman it was because of the angles and to batsman it would feel like the ball is getting faster.
if a batsman is expecting the ball to reach at him around 2 feet but actually comes at 1.5 feet it would be seem the ball was faster off the pitch because the distance the needs to travel to reach 2feet is more than if had to travel 1.5 feet. One of the major reasons when batsman got bowled by Asif they fell to their knees as if the ball was to low or went to fast by them.
 
That delivery that he got Sehwag with on absolutely dead wicket of Karachi was show of Asif's talent. He never done justice to his talent.
 
Nasty Naz said:
Could have had a run of years of incredible bowling with Asif/Amir/Junaid/Ajmal/Hafeez.
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If Pakistan had peak Waqar Wasim Akhtar and Saqlain all playing together... possibly could have been the best bowling attack of all time.
 
MRSN said:
That delivery that he got Sehwag with on absolutely dead wicket of Karachi was show of Asif's talent. He never done justice to his talent.
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That wicket was the furthest thing from dead

Probably the greenest international cricket twicket produced in Pakistan in the last 20 years
 
Slog said:
That wicket was the furthest thing from dead

Probably the greenest international cricket twicket produced in Pakistan in the last 20 years
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yeah it was on the first day aka irfan pathan hatrick, and somewhat greener on second day ind got bundled in 240, but from 3rd day onward it was absolute phatta, proof pak scored 600 on that same pitch in 2nd inning, and then did it suddenly change in to green mamba when asif torn apart that fab five indian batting line up? Plz check some facts before posting.
 
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Slog said:
That wicket was the furthest thing from dead

Probably the greenest international cricket twicket produced in Pakistan in the last 20 years
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We still scored 600 odd in the 3rd innings :akhtar
 
Syed1 said:
The only way it can 'look' faster to the batsman is if he is expecting it to be slower based on the bowler's action/arm speed but the bowler delivers it faster due to his strong wrists. Which is the case with Asif.
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It's similar to a spinner who gets huge revs on the ball.

It bites off the pitch as if it sped up. Warne often made batsmen look silly for this reason.
 
Zeshan547 said:
yeah it was on the first day aka irfan pathan hatrick, and somewhat greener on second day ind got bundled in 240, but from 3rd day onward it was absolute phatta, proof pak scored 600 on that same pitch in 2nd inning, and then did it suddenly change in to green mamba when asif torn apart that fab five indian batting line up? Plz check some facts before posting.
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All green wickets eventually flatten
Blistering Barnacle said:
Did you watch cricket then and did you see the match?
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I was actually AT the match
Blistering Barnacle said:
That Indian batting line up was a killer, while we had guys like Butt, Farhat, Iqbal, Afridi.
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Obviously. Not doubting that

It was an unbelievable effort ofcourse but just correcting the dead wicket part
 
I get it, the guy bowled a few magic deliveries almost a decade ago.. time for us to move on, fans will go on how about Asif is needed here, if Sohail Khan being 33 comes back his second spell and bowls at 120 clicks, you can expect Asif to bowl like Tanvir ahmed in the spells after the first one.. we can't carry a passenger in the Test side that can't bat, can't field, but is the side because of his first 10 overs
 
kingusama92 said:
It's similar to a spinner who gets huge revs on the ball.

It bites off the pitch as if it sped up. Warne often made batsmen look silly for this reason.
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Indeed. Velocity is speed plus direction. Change in velocity is acceleration.
 
Sunny_majoka said:
I think we should move on. We can find more bowlers like him if we make changes to our cricket structure. And allow youngsters to excel.
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Chances are 'we' won't. PPers dont appreciate the kind of bowling plied by Asif. Most believe Akram to a better bowler than McGrath. Show us someone who bowls with immaculate control and we will ask only how fast he is? Perhaps whether he brings 'variety' or some such to the attack? Does not matter if he is taking wickets galore. Hence is it becomes a truism that Asif is an exception, a once in a generation bowler.
 
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Could be a dumb question, but why did the ordinary Amir get another chance after the match fixing stuff, yet Asif who's miles better doesn't? Is it simply an age thing or was there a longer punishment for Asif?
 
Kevin Pietersen opts out of IPL 2017 auction

KP: " I won't be going into the IPL auction. My winter has been too busy with all my travel & I don't want to spend April/May away too!
 
ABD also considers Mohammad Asif as toughest bowler he ever faced.
 
If Amir is given a chance ,there is no point keeping Asif away from doing national duty, the Pakistan bowling is dismal for almost 8 years now. He will still do better than the Rahats and Imrans out there,surely
 
joly said:
If Amir is given a chance ,there is no point keeping Asif away from doing national duty, the Pakistan bowling is dismal for almost 8 years now. He will still do better than the Rahats and Imrans out there,surely
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The same Asif who had the keeper standing up to him, and had no impact once the pitch flattened out.
 
[VIDEO] Kevin Pietersen names Mohammad Asif among the top 5 bowlers he's faced

"Mohammad Asif, the fast-bowler, his ability to accelerate off the wicket I thought was just phenomenal" : KP

Capture.JPG
 
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Asif made KP, AB, Amla, Clarke, Sanga, look rather amateurish with his seam movement.
 
Just makes a fan feel even worse seeing stuff like this.

What could have been :(

Was definitely going for ATG status, if he only would have stayed on the right path.
 
Asif had a genius ability. Shame he chose wrong path in his career. Could have been what Steyn is today.
 
Dont think warne troubled him more than Asif from what i have seen but cant really dispute it when he says it himself.
 
Saurav said:
no McGrath,Steyn?
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2005 ashes Mcgra was close to unplayable in some matches and kp was the only one who demolish him with flat bated hits

And i have never seen some one murdering steyn brutally like kp did in headingley back in 2012
 
If am not wrong he looks pretty comfortable against warne whenever he faces him
 
Hitman said:
Add to that, both of them absolutely dislike each other.
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Warne and KP? They are best mates with one another. In fact, Warnie was the one who told the ECB to drop Thorpe for KP if they were serious about competing in the 05’ Ashes.
 
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