An Open Letter To Mohammad Amir | Cricket News, Articles, Cartoons, Statistics

You’re 18 years old. Tall, thin to the point of anorexic. Left handed. And you are part of an endangered species. You can bowl a cricket ball at blinding pace, and make it do things in the air and off the pitch. In your last 11 innings where the opposition involved Australia and England at home, you’ve taken 30 wickets at an average of 19.80. You’ve made some of the best batsmen around look very circumspect and have received praise from some of the game’s great quick bowlers. Even in the arcane world of Pakistan test team selection you are guaranteed to be among the first 3 names down on the team sheet as your more experienced peers start to show the unmistakable signs of age and substance abuse.

It’s really not a trick question. You concentrate on staying fit, look at adding some muscle to sustain your bowling, you watch and learn. You bowl frighteningly fast and you enjoy it. In the process you arouse many a marketer, publicist and IPL team owner to pay you obscene amounts of money to endorse shampoos, wear jerseys held together by sponsor logos. You pay off your family debt, buy swank pads in downtown Lahore, custom-order Lamborghinis. For your other urges, you blow off steam at IPL parties and partake of the buffet of ‘international’ escorts, ahem, models, all in the name of contractual commitments.

What you don’t do, you damn fool, is to agree with lesser talented team-mates, to bowl rigged no-balls. Don’t you get it?! Or we’ll have nothing but the middling medium pace of the Kulasekharas, the Praveen Kumars and the Tuffeys, the coma-inducing finger-tweaking tedium of the Swanns and Jadejas. The front-foot swagger of the Dilshans and the Rainas as they cart yet another six over midwicket. You fuckin’ idiot! Cricket needs your kind to survive!

ramki on 2010-09-04 19:18:11 - dejavu

Some years back another Mohammed, also thin, lanky and amazingly talented made a dream debut. Scored 3 centuries on the trot. Went on to become Captain. And then went on to shame and dishonour. This Mohammed's done the crash course. Why waste time?

Anoop Vijaykumar on 2010-09-04 20:11:50

ramki, i wudn't necessarily generalise and let's just say talented quick bowlers are a slightly rarer commodity :D

Kirby on 2010-09-04 00:59:27

I think the world generally agrees that his (potential) involvement in this is utterly depressin. He had such a future before him. I am praying this turns out to be untrue, just so that I can keep loving Amir.

Vishal Shah on 2010-09-03 12:40:13

yeah, if this does prove to be a true allegation one of the most promising bowling careers might endup in a tragedy

Anoop Vijaykumar on 2010-09-04 20:13:15

lets hope sharad pawar and co don't get to cut short that career. it'd be irony if the purveyors of so much corruption get to sit in judgment over spot-fixing

Rohan on 2010-09-03 12:37:40

Just when I thought that we have a potential legend or all-time great in the game, this scandal erupts and poof, now we may be left with the most disappointing career of all-time :(

Syed Mohammed Ali Zaidi on 2010-09-03 10:43:11 - Premature analysis

There is no doubt about what has been written in the letter, He is destined to be one the highest wicket taker in cricket history, but i think that a dum ass counting cash in front of the camera and claiming that he has several cricketers as his salves does not prove any thing. these guyz might be innocent.

However on the other side of the story, if this is in fact a true alligation then these playes are the real dum asses because they hired such an idiot to strike deal when thay couls have made more money by more legitimate ways.

Anoop Vijaykumar on 2010-09-03 15:06:08

fair point but remember he's only 18. i'd go as far as to say that this mess is partly the BCCI's fault with their stance of leaving Pak players out of the IPL. Somehow the administrators just never get saddled with any REAL responsibility for the game aside from counting cash from sponsorship deals.

narcissists on 2010-09-05 16:29:47

When modestly remunerated young men are placed in an envioronment where lakhs can be made off each ball by non-participants in the game, then the temptations placed before them can be irresistible. The only way to ensure honesty is to pay the players well & then watch them like hawks..!!
Thats wat we (india) hav done.. but while our players go out & bat for India, crores are still made off tat game by non - participants : the Cricket Administrators..!!

Anoop Vijaykumar on 2010-09-07 13:04:04

narcissists, the BCCI's stand of not including Pak players in the IPL could be another factor that pushed them. Although i wouldn't agree with your assertion that the Indian players are pure as driven snow. The opportunities to script little passages in meaningless encounters are numerous and hard to identify. I have often wondered about lopsided field placings and curiously defensive fields and bowling changes in certain match situations which were uncharacteristic of the captain involved.

Rohan Kallicharan on 2010-09-03 06:01:47 - Well Said

It is a refreshing change to see somebody taking the approach of the open-letter to this issue. I have spent much of the week listening to people suggesting that Amir should be treated differently because of his age and talent.

Sadly, this should not be the case. Whatever the sanction that is eventually handed out, the key is that he is taught that what has been done is wrong, and taken under somebody's wing to ensure that this does not happen again upon his return to the game.

Brutally, but beautifully written.

Anoop Vijaykumar on 2010-09-03 15:02:17

Rohan, thanks for the comment. the worry here is that we lose one of the most exciting talents to come around in a while.
i just hope whatever action is taken is suited to the transgression and not to make a public statement.

Abhishek on 2010-09-02 23:51:49 - Sad

It's sad that Amir got involved in this...... Was just thinking that he might have (or indeed still can) go on to be the highest wicket taking fast bowler of all time... considering how young and how good he is...

Well written...

Anoop Vijaykumar on 2010-09-03 15:07:27

thanks abhishek. dunno about highest wicket-takers since that takes a level of determination shown by very few, but he certainly made watching test cricket fun again :)

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