when it comes to classy cricket batsmen, pakistani cricket fans were spoilt for choice in the 90s and for most of 00s. lineup including in its midst, top order of saeed anwer, inzi, ijaz, salim malik, moyo and lower order of moin khan, azhar mehmood, razzak and wasim akram could dominate most bowling sides. in fact, i would argue that results would have been more consistent if that lineup included work horse/blue collar type batsman like misbah or azhar ali who could grind it out when required. miandad played such a role but his retirement left a hole which was partly filled by inzamam who was more talented than miandad but did not not have the smarts or competitive desire of miandad.
one reason pakistani batting talent improved markedly in the 90s is due to improvement in quality of domestic bowling- both fast as well as spin. as a result, the step up between domestic and international cricket was not as much as it is today. it is for this reason that pak was able to dominate india esp in odis for about 20 year period starting in late 80's. indian top order of that period was talented as pakistani top order but pakistani middle and lower order could take apart indian attack much more frequently than indian lower order which also had to deal with a better pakistani bowling unit. however, even after the retirement of wasim and waqar, pak had a winning odi record against india until the end of '00s.
these days unfortunately, gap between domestic and intl levels is much greater hence many batsmen are like dear in the headlight when they step up. this is why misbah deserves credit as a batsman. in his second coming, misbah, like fawad alam, was thrown in the deep end with the added burden of captaincy. moreover, batting unit under misbah was weaker than pakistani batting sides of the previous two decades. so in this context, misbah's batting returns are highly commendable. more often than not, he was putting out fire which required him to bat in a certain way which influenced his game when he became captain.
in contrast to misbah's cinderella story, babar has emerged on the scene with silver spoon in his mouth. there was little pressure for him to perform which enabled him to grow into his game. in this, people who identified and backed his talent deserve credit. thankfully for pakistani fans, babar's game is built along the lines of his illustrious predecessors who played with some flair. for the team to be successful pak needs players who can put opposition on the back-foot as well as those who can grind teams down. unfortunately given bowling levels in domestic, pak batsmen are not getting anywhere by playing domestic. an argument can be made of identifying talent early and throwing those players to intl level sooner rather than later and giving these players some leeway. unfortunately patience is not a virtue associated with pakistani fans.
