Muhammad Amir’s controversial World Cup spot

When news of the Pakistan World Cup squad broke on April 25, 2019, what did the first thing majority try to find out the most from the list revealed? Did they desire to know the name of any surprising inclusion in the squad? Were they extremely curious to see the name of any power hitter in the side? Did they take a deep breath after seeing the name of Muhammad Hafeez in the middle of the list? Basically, all of them just wanted to know whether Muhammad Amir would be the wearing green jersey in the summer or not.

The tensions started arousing in their minds after they found out that The Oval triumphant will not be representing their home nation at the Hugest Cricket Carnival.

The social media channels were flooded with the sympathies for Amir. Many of them were of the view that the bowling line-up of the men in green appears toothless without the presence of the reputed left-arm fast bowler.

How much selfish of the fans this reaction was? Hafeez made a comeback into the team after his worrying thumb injury that would’ve destroyed his World Cup dream, Muhammad Hasnain would be having an opportunity to throw the fireballs at the mega event, Shaheen Khan got a privilege to be the front-line fast bowler, but all they cared about the underperforming seam bowler who merely got 5 wickets in his last 14 outings.

Fans of the Pakistan cricket residing in North America, who couldn’t watch games of their team attentively due to the odd match timings in their country were pleased on the exclusion of Amir from the World Cup squad. They complained and showed furiousness on the defense brigade of Amir on the social media, “Are you guys insane? The statistics of the lad demonstrates that he’s nowhere near to be a deserving candidate of the World Cup spot. The economy rate of 4 doesn’t matter. We need an option that has a wicket-taking ability.”

The fans played a blame game without having in-depth of the Amir’s gameplay. They didn’t watch his spells live on the television due to inconvenient match timings in their residential country. They decide that Amir doesn’t deserve the World Cup call-up based on the statistics and charts.

What about the silly catch drops by the fielders which brought his confidence immensely down? What about the capitalization of his fellow seam bowlers due to the build-up he provided? What about delivering an economy rate of less than 5 in the batsmen dominated era?

Muhammad Amir caught a virus during the World Cup prep series against England and saw his fellow bowlers been thrashed all around the corners. There was no mercy shown by the home side and the bowlers appeared to be the workhorses that have no idea of the disciplined line and length.

Suddenly his economical stint had a value. Finally, his eagerness for the game got the value. At last, everybody was on the same page. They realize the need for a leader in their bowling attack. He was called back into the side for the mega event on high demand.

A pundit questions whether Amir would be able to handle the burden of these many expectations? Would he be able to display the recap of the Champions Trophy final when he dismissed the star-studded top-order of one of the best batting sides in the world?

When Muhammad Amir will grab the new ball on May 31 in the inaugural World Cup game of Pakistan against West Indies, there could be peak chunk of stresses and tensions traveling around in his thoughts.

But if he decides to resume his scintillating aura at the stage where it really matters, he could be among the marvels guiding Pakistan to the mega event glory.