da dobrowin： It was a day for the new boys at Old Trafford
The Wisden Verdict by Steven Lynch17-Jun-2003It was a day for the new boys at Old Trafford. England blooded threebrand-new one-day players, and while Pakistan had no actualdebutants, their team bore little resemblance to the one that wentthrough the motions in the World Cup.England’s new men were Rikki Clarke, Anthony McGrath and JimTroughton. The jury’s out on two of them: Troughton hit one beautifulboundary in his 6 before falling to his very next ball, and Clarkebagged a second-ball duck before collecting a first-ball wicket later onwith a fairly ordinary delivery. But McGrath, who obviously enjoyedconfounding the nay-sayers at Test level, did the double by playing amature innings-stretching knock after wickets tumbled. McGrath milked33 from 75 balls, and did his best to nudge England towards 200.Vikram Solanki, not quite new but fresh enough to count as such,smacked one luscious straight four followed by a six in the samedirection that reminded you why Ian Botham makes all that fuss abouthim, and his 36 in as many balls hinted at better things to come.On the other side Mohammad Hafeez was a dead ringer for SaqlainMushtaq with the ball, and did a passable impersonation of MushtaqMohammad with the bat.But the unofficial award for new man of the match goes to anotherPakistani. Mohammad Sami has been in and out of the Pakistan teamas Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis have come and gone. Now theyseem to have gone for good (not that you’d bet on that), and withShoaib Akhtar suspended, Sami had his chance.And he took that first opportunity to imprint himself on Englishwatchers. Small and wiry, with an appearance and run-up like AqibJaved of not-so-distant memory, Sami skipped up to the crease, all bighair and arms, and whirred the ball down at a stunning rate. He lookslike a fifth-former, but the speedo was touching 96mph. He wiped outMarcus Trescothick with a peach from the McGrath manual (that’sGlenn, not Anthony), and threatened until near the end of his spell,when he went for a few.With the Lowryesque Umar Gul gangling in at the other end, Pakistanmight just make up for the loss of Wasim and Waqar’s 918 one-daywickets rather quicker than they expected.Steven Lynch is editor of Wisden CricInfo.