There was a little bit of grass on the surface at the Zayed Cricket Stadium in Abu Dhabi on Monday. It may not have been the kind of live, lush grass fast bowlers dream about, but there it was and it got one captain thinking.
Angelo Mathews talked happily about the fast bowlers who have come along, especially the young, uncapped Vishwa Fernando, who he feels has a little extra pace.
Misbah-ul-Haq knows better, though. He knows there is help for the seamers, particularly in the mornings. He has his own pace headaches to resolve. But he also knows it is generally a slow surface, so more than two seamers is close to a luxury. He did play three here once, against these same opponents back in 2011, and he should have won that Test had it not been for at least seven dropped chances on the last day.
But who are we kidding? Seamers may play a role, a key one at some point, but the bulk of the work through the series – and much of the focus – will fall on the spinners, and two in particular.
Rangana Herath and Saeed Ajmal like playing against each other’s sides. Herath has 51 wickets in 12 Tests against Pakistan and has inflicted some serious wounds on them in the past. Ajmal has 47 in nine Tests against Sri Lanka and was instrumental in their series win in the UAE in 2011/12. But those simple numbers mask the serious effort both have had to put in and the cost at which that success has come.
In recent years, Herath has not been as dangerous as he was earlier against Pakistan and Ajmal has not ripped through Sri Lanka as he has other sides.
The strike rates for both against the other’s side are instructive, both considerably higher than their career strike rates. Kumar Sangakkara, who has 1,006 runs in his past six Tests against Pakistan, has played Ajmal consistently better than any batsman in the world.
Understandably, then, both captains were pretty bullish about how they might fare through the series. “He is a good bowler and he did well against Pakistan, but our batsmen have scored enough against him also,” Misbah pointed out.
“Ajmal has been talked about a lot in the team and we’ve made plans about how we are going to play him,” Mathews said. “There’s good experience in the team, if you take Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene and Prasanna Jayawardene.
“Although we no longer have TM Dilshan, we’ve got some experienced players. With that experience, we should be able play him well, give him no wickets and make big totals.”
Sounds straightforward enough.
osamiuddin@thenational.ae
