Kaneria's rise, and Pakistan's home worries

Carrying forward a tradition
Abdul Qadir, Mushtaq Ahmed, and ... Danish Kaneria? The first two names are among the best exponents of the art of legspin bowling in the last 30 years, but does Kaneria's name belong there? Probably not yet, but if experts are to be believed, he would be a part of that group in the next few years.

Kaneria's 10 for 190 against Sri Lanka at Karachi was his second ten-for in Tests, but, considering that his other effort came against Bangladesh, this is obviously the one which has made critics sit up and take notice. And, after 20 Test matches, Kaneria hasn't done badly at all.

A look at the table below reveals numbers that look extremely impressive: an average of 28, a strike rate of a wicket every 10 overs, and wickets-per-Test rate of almost 4.5 - stats which are all better than what Qadir or Mushtaq had at a corresponding stage in their career (or, indeed, at the end of their career).

If experts aren't rushing into a verdict on him yet, it's because he hasn't quite proved himself against all opposition and in all conditions: 18 of his 20 Tests have been in the subcontinent. In the only two Tests he played outside - against New Zealand earlier this year - Kaneria returned overall figures of 3 for 222. He has also feasted on the hapless Bangladesh, against whom he's taken 34 wickets in five matches at 16. Remove those matches from his career stats, and they look rather less impressive: 53 wickets in 15 Tests at 35.62. And he hasn't quite mastered the art of bowling in the first innings, where his figures look quite ordinary.

However, it's quite evident that he is moving in the right direction: against South Africa late last year, he took 5 for 46 at Lahore to pave the way for a Pakistan win. His matchwinning effort against Sri Lanka demonstrated in ample measure his ability to bowl accurate spells over long periods of time. As for tougher challenges, they're just around the corner - Pakistan tour Australia later this year. (Click here for Kaneria's career summary.)

Home worries
Meanwhile, Pakistan's 1-1 series against Sri Lanka was an improvement on the two earlier instances they played Sri Lanka at home, but it continued their trend of struggling in home series. As the table below shows, since 1990, Pakistan is the only team which performs better when playing overseas. Australia have an awesome overseas record too, winning 14 out of 22, but their home record is even better. The team with the maximum difference between home and away records is India, whose 14-3 win-loss record at home is in stark contrast to their 3-12 overseas figure.

Malik's latent talent
Bob Woolmer has been credited with bringing in many improvements to Pakistan cricket, but one of his most significant ones has been to utilise, more than had ever been done before, the potential of Shoaib Malik. Woolmer's move to promote Malik to No. 3 in the one-dayers came in for plenty of flak initially, but the results after a few early hiccups have been spectacular.

Muhammad Usman Sharif, a fan of this column, wrote in to point out Malik's amazing upturn in performance of late. In the 16 one-dayers since Woolmer took charge, Malik has been Man of the Match on five occasions, which is the number of times he had bagged the award in his previous 68 ODIs. That confidence rubbed off on the Test arena too, when he came in to bat at a crucial stage in the Karachi Test against Sri Lanka, and blasted an unbeaten 53 from 60 balls to decisively swing the match Pakistan's way in double-quick time.