Bilal Ahmad15
Local Club Regular
- Joined
- Jun 6, 2018
- Runs
- 1,582
- Post of the Week
- 4
Now that the Karachi Leg is done, here are my thoughts;
Before PSL 7 began, I had very low hopes for the whole tournament overall, few reasons being no hype at all from anyone or anything, nothing unique being done for this PSL, and also other matches will be played in Karachi and Lahore, two awful stadiums with disappointing low attendance of fans... which we all saw in the Pakistan-West Indies Series.
But I'm surprised, as the PSL matches haven't been that bad. They haven't been too boring for me, and crowd size for the majority of matches have actually been pretty good, if you exclude the daytime matches. So the matches have been watchable, which means success IMO. However, that doesn't mean the matches have been of best quality.
Some major problems with these first 15 Karachi matches is it was dominated way too much by Batting, and power hitting. Too many instances where we saw teams go from 150 - 160 to 200+ in 2,3 or 4 overs... seriously, come on. One thing the matches for the best PSL seasons had was the majority of matches was dominated by bowling (but not too much), and therefore the run chase was always tight, there were few 'slog' matches. I remember Overseas players, commentators also talking about PSL is a competitive league due to most matches having tough run chases and more difficult for teams to make big runs easily, unlike majority of other T20 leagues.
And so, when we keep seeing teams making, 210, 230, 220, 200, its not good for the PSL, since its just the same as all the other Pyjama Leagues.
And so, two main reasons due to this was because the outfield was just way too fast. In these 15 matches we have seen the following:
If the ball got some very tiny edge on the bat, the ball flies away for four, and if the fielder does some very tiny misfield, it races for four. Once it goes past the ring, on 99% of the time, it's a four. It would be great if this can be controlled, but I don't think it can be.
The boundary length is too small, although, to be fair one thing I have liked is that the distance for majority of sixes have been pretty good, in the 80s, if not then high 70s. We have seen a few 100 meters, and quite a few 90 meter sixes.
Another factor is that PSL has a very weird occurrence where average players and failures succeed highly in PSL (whereas legends like Gayle, McCullum, AB have failed), and a lot of these average players are the ones who have scored a lot of runs quickly, and so PCB and Ramiz Raja (or someone) needs to realise that all franchises need to sign as few mediocre players as possible (but a very unrealistic ask for most franchises). No more Will Smeed, Harry Brook, David Wiese Types.
PSL 7 Team of the Tournament So Far
1. Fakhar Zaman
2. Mohammad Rizwan (c) (wk)
3. Colin Munro (NZ)
4. Shadab Khan
5. Tim David (SNG)
6. Khushdil Shah
7. Mubashir Khan
8. David Willey (ENG)
9. Shaheen Shah Afridi
10. Imran Tahir (SA)
11. Zaman Khan
MVP: Shadab Khan
Best Batsman: Fakhar Zaman
Best Bowler: Imran Tahir (But one can definitely go for Khushdil Shah, David Willey or Shaheen Shah)
Best Wicket-Keeper: Mohammad Rizwan
Best Emerging Player: Zaman Khan
So overall, the Karachi Leg/ first of PSL has been decent so far, which for me is a surprise. But I don't have high expectations for Lahore Leg.
Before PSL 7 began, I had very low hopes for the whole tournament overall, few reasons being no hype at all from anyone or anything, nothing unique being done for this PSL, and also other matches will be played in Karachi and Lahore, two awful stadiums with disappointing low attendance of fans... which we all saw in the Pakistan-West Indies Series.
But I'm surprised, as the PSL matches haven't been that bad. They haven't been too boring for me, and crowd size for the majority of matches have actually been pretty good, if you exclude the daytime matches. So the matches have been watchable, which means success IMO. However, that doesn't mean the matches have been of best quality.
Some major problems with these first 15 Karachi matches is it was dominated way too much by Batting, and power hitting. Too many instances where we saw teams go from 150 - 160 to 200+ in 2,3 or 4 overs... seriously, come on. One thing the matches for the best PSL seasons had was the majority of matches was dominated by bowling (but not too much), and therefore the run chase was always tight, there were few 'slog' matches. I remember Overseas players, commentators also talking about PSL is a competitive league due to most matches having tough run chases and more difficult for teams to make big runs easily, unlike majority of other T20 leagues.
And so, when we keep seeing teams making, 210, 230, 220, 200, its not good for the PSL, since its just the same as all the other Pyjama Leagues.
And so, two main reasons due to this was because the outfield was just way too fast. In these 15 matches we have seen the following:
If the ball got some very tiny edge on the bat, the ball flies away for four, and if the fielder does some very tiny misfield, it races for four. Once it goes past the ring, on 99% of the time, it's a four. It would be great if this can be controlled, but I don't think it can be.
The boundary length is too small, although, to be fair one thing I have liked is that the distance for majority of sixes have been pretty good, in the 80s, if not then high 70s. We have seen a few 100 meters, and quite a few 90 meter sixes.
Another factor is that PSL has a very weird occurrence where average players and failures succeed highly in PSL (whereas legends like Gayle, McCullum, AB have failed), and a lot of these average players are the ones who have scored a lot of runs quickly, and so PCB and Ramiz Raja (or someone) needs to realise that all franchises need to sign as few mediocre players as possible (but a very unrealistic ask for most franchises). No more Will Smeed, Harry Brook, David Wiese Types.
PSL 7 Team of the Tournament So Far
1. Fakhar Zaman
2. Mohammad Rizwan (c) (wk)
3. Colin Munro (NZ)
4. Shadab Khan
5. Tim David (SNG)
6. Khushdil Shah
7. Mubashir Khan
8. David Willey (ENG)
9. Shaheen Shah Afridi
10. Imran Tahir (SA)
11. Zaman Khan
MVP: Shadab Khan
Best Batsman: Fakhar Zaman
Best Bowler: Imran Tahir (But one can definitely go for Khushdil Shah, David Willey or Shaheen Shah)
Best Wicket-Keeper: Mohammad Rizwan
Best Emerging Player: Zaman Khan
So overall, the Karachi Leg/ first of PSL has been decent so far, which for me is a surprise. But I don't have high expectations for Lahore Leg.
