Bouncer
Local Club Star
- Joined
- Feb 9, 2005
- Runs
- 2,192
- Post of the Week
- 1
Irfan is just one of the guys in the team who are just not in touch with what is the meaning of a professional athlete & the fitness requirements that now come with it.
In Pak culture the trend now has become that you train hard and focus on healthy diet only when you are attending a training camp or have been chosen to tour with the team. Anytime outside that time, just doing a net session twice a week is good enough to sharpen your skills as allah has blessed you with all of the talent in the world, oh yeah..Now that you are an international cricketer and make money...that means now you got to enjoy the money by eating unhealthy at home and when your buddies in home time want to hangout then head out to Mcdonald's and KFC which did not exist in your town 10 years ago so eating that food will show your friends that "You have made it" & will be a status symbol on social media.
In other places athletes train twice as hard during off season to sharpen their own skills on their own time. For example Bolt ran for less than 2 minutes in the three olympic golds that he got, but he had been training since 2000, so in 16 years of training he ran tens (if not hundreds) of thousand of training runs to get to the point where he won nine golds in under 2 minutes of running. If Usain was Pakistani cricketer he would have been told or believed that after winning his first gold, he is extremely talented and just can get away with training right before olympics.
Whereas in Pakistan you only sharpen your skills while you are at training camp or in NCA where you have coaches to help you. The concept of self analysis and one's own efforts to improve one's technical side of cricket is not considered because everyone has been made to believe that talent alone is good enough.
I read Steve Waugh's "Out of my Comfort Zone" almost 8 years ago and I remember remember one of the comment made by him, when he compared player's diets from 80's to 90's and he said when I started playing, we considered Big Mac healthy because there were shredded lettuce in it. But they did change in late 80's/early 90's and were the early adopters towards having a scientific approach towards cricketer's nutritional requirements. I am sure that their players take care of their bodies with healthy diets and improve their skills not only during the season but also during off season as well.
Many believe that Irfan's issue is only physical fitness but I think his issues are beyond fitness and he is just not able to bowl as a bowler as he never was a cricketer. We got some wickets out of him and the guy made good money for a bit of work but this is where it should end. The guy has every right to keep on playing domestic cricket and PSL to make money but there should be someone wise enough to decide that his international cricket served it purpose in 2013 and that is where it should end.
I personally have never believed him to be cricketer let alone a bowler. He might still get picked in future and perhaps is even going to win you a game or two but he is NOT suppose to be on a cricket field for international competition.
In Pak culture the trend now has become that you train hard and focus on healthy diet only when you are attending a training camp or have been chosen to tour with the team. Anytime outside that time, just doing a net session twice a week is good enough to sharpen your skills as allah has blessed you with all of the talent in the world, oh yeah..Now that you are an international cricketer and make money...that means now you got to enjoy the money by eating unhealthy at home and when your buddies in home time want to hangout then head out to Mcdonald's and KFC which did not exist in your town 10 years ago so eating that food will show your friends that "You have made it" & will be a status symbol on social media.
In other places athletes train twice as hard during off season to sharpen their own skills on their own time. For example Bolt ran for less than 2 minutes in the three olympic golds that he got, but he had been training since 2000, so in 16 years of training he ran tens (if not hundreds) of thousand of training runs to get to the point where he won nine golds in under 2 minutes of running. If Usain was Pakistani cricketer he would have been told or believed that after winning his first gold, he is extremely talented and just can get away with training right before olympics.
Whereas in Pakistan you only sharpen your skills while you are at training camp or in NCA where you have coaches to help you. The concept of self analysis and one's own efforts to improve one's technical side of cricket is not considered because everyone has been made to believe that talent alone is good enough.
I read Steve Waugh's "Out of my Comfort Zone" almost 8 years ago and I remember remember one of the comment made by him, when he compared player's diets from 80's to 90's and he said when I started playing, we considered Big Mac healthy because there were shredded lettuce in it. But they did change in late 80's/early 90's and were the early adopters towards having a scientific approach towards cricketer's nutritional requirements. I am sure that their players take care of their bodies with healthy diets and improve their skills not only during the season but also during off season as well.
Many believe that Irfan's issue is only physical fitness but I think his issues are beyond fitness and he is just not able to bowl as a bowler as he never was a cricketer. We got some wickets out of him and the guy made good money for a bit of work but this is where it should end. The guy has every right to keep on playing domestic cricket and PSL to make money but there should be someone wise enough to decide that his international cricket served it purpose in 2013 and that is where it should end.
I personally have never believed him to be cricketer let alone a bowler. He might still get picked in future and perhaps is even going to win you a game or two but he is NOT suppose to be on a cricket field for international competition.