I remember him looking clueless against Herath but yes Perera might have ended up with his wicket more times. It was just that he simply couldn't pick up Herath like majority of batters were against Ajmal.
Think he will become better with time, Younis or Yousaf will help him along the way. Thankfully he is not with Grant Flower now who would just go like "I have no idea what is wrong with Babar" or "There is nothing more I can do about it"
No clue to be perfectly honest as I only watched those games sporadically.
I have only really restarted watching home games after more or less a decade. Just because we have started transitioning back to PAK.
Before this, even my (user)namesake's batting would appear to be a drag in UAE.
I saw some clips of BA on YT the other day with YK feeding him drills. BA managed to replicate his lack of conviction in strokes from gameplay to nets.
Also worried if YK has diagnosed the correct problem or if BA has mentioned it explicitly. Personal opinion, since Kuldeep's dismissal of BA off a wrong in Asia Cup'18, is that he does not have a read on the hand. Tries to get into a neutral position to get close to the ball but when it lands with flight on a good length and he has not conviction as to its direction, he ends up pressing forward and hoping for the best.
Another relevant example could be of BA's dismissal off Embuldeniya when he got BA in the 2nd Test in 2019. I think it was the 40th or 50th over. Babar had defended two flighted/loopy deliveries on off, reasonably solidly. Then he defended one slightly unconvincingly and got a thick inside edge. For some reason on the ball after he came down the track, was beaten in flight, the ball turned appreciably and he was left stranded in the middle of the pitch.
The impression I got was that despite having defended the earlier balls he was not sure which of them might turn and which might skid on which caused him to lose his confidence in dead-batting it.
I am a little worried about Babar because in the last few decades I have not seen batsmen at sea against spin in such fashion, on such a regular basis.
Rambo sometimes struggled against spin. You could argue Saeed liked pace on the ball too. Mudassar and lot were OK, I guess. Zed didn't have as much of an issue. JM shouldn't even be mentioned here. Inzamam used to occasionally have to labour his feet into action early into his innings against the likes of Warne or Kumble.
But not to the point of their facial expressions telegraphing to the world that they were unsure whether the bowler would be delivering the ball from the right hand or the left.
As much as I admire YK the player, I just do not know to what extent he can coach/teach someone like Babar who has a well-developed game already. YK's own style is not one to be replicated. The closest may be MoYo but MoYo occasionally got into a tangle against spin himself - nothing like this kid though.
In fairness, I am not a big believer in large-scale execution/technique related changes once people arrive at this level. Regardless of the coach being a local/foreigner/extra-terrestrial.
Thankfully, this is not a wholesale change and is something that the batsman/coaches should be able to rectify.
Feel like a data/visuals/footage led approach on reading the hand may benefit BA coupled with spending time against all those spinners in domestic + PSL, guys who manage to bowl their stock ball and 10 other variations within each allotted over.
But my reading could be wrong and Babar's press could be purely impulsive and all this could go away pretty soon. I know what I am hoping for.
