Nah... Waqar was so bad that he was dropped soon after. Wasim, while good, was nowhere near his best and was perhaps at the same level as Venky Prasad in that series in those conditions. His ball to Dravid was awesome but his bowling was just that, flashes of brilliance then. Not consistently good as he used to be. Saqlain was easily the real threat.
like I said, Waqar had declined, but I do remember him bowling a good spell towards the end of the day 3. Waqar did play the test series in Aus after that IIRC
flattened out track, yeah, but India were tottering at 58/5 vs Donald, McMillan, Pollock, Klusener ... having to get 329 to avoid follow-on. The counter-attack from him and Azhar was too amazing ....
That series in Australia happened before the India series. And Waqar was dropped for Shoaib at Kolkata.
The Aus series in late 99 was after the India series in early 99 ..
why focus on waqar in isolation? he might not have been that great at that point, but that attack is still more fearsome than anything india was putting out, or has ever put out. no way that afridi's knock was better, though it was still a rather good one, from all accounts.
no.. that attack was not better than many of the Indian attacks, esp. in Indian conditions. Heck, even our attack that series was just as good as theirs. Waqar was a washed up version just about bowling 80 to 83 mph. Wasim was good but not all that good and definitely was not consistently asking questions of batsmen like he used to. Saqlain was head and shoulders above the rest of the Pak bowlers. Compare that to India with an inform Srinath, Prasad and Kumble... How is that attack better than ours? We lost those games because we batted a bit worse than them, simple as that.
So the fact that he was dropped a game after the Chennai test is not as relevant as him playing a series almost a year later with respect to his form DURING that India tour?
just saying Waqar was not totally out of the picture in 99.
IMO, top form Saqlain+wasim bowling well made that attack better than India's though I wouldn't say it was that it was much better ...
He was dropped. It was the reason given and there has never been any controversy around it. He was really that woeful in the preceding two tests.. I watched the chennai game live at the ground and I still don't recall a single testing spell from Waqar in the whole game.
yeah, that is why Ramesh was pasting them and Venky was taking 6 fers...
And you said spinners (plural).. would LOVE to know why the washed up Mushtaq or that Nadeem were any better than Sunil Joshi tbh..
am sure u'd LOVE a lot of other things as well!
nah, they were good in home conditions, but not that good as you are making them out to be.
Not sure what exactly you remember, but
Besides these 3, I would like to know how Tendulkar's following innings are rated in your system...
