The line-up for the inaugural World Twenty20 semifinals has been finalised. And a mouth-watering prospect of a Pakistan-India final is a possibility now!

Pakistan, topping their Super Eights group after winning all of their three matches, faced New Zealand in their first semifinal yesterday (Saturday). Meanwhile India knocked out the hosts South Africa out of the tournament and qualified for the semis where they faced the might of Australia.

The World Twenty20 event has all been about sensational and thrilling matches. And to cap that, many records have been made to add a bit of gloss to T20 cricket's shine. Australia's Brett Lee took the first hat-trick in T20 internationals, against Bangladesh; Yuvraj Singh of India hammered six sixes off a Stuart Broad over to create new records, the other one of the fastest fifty (off just 12 balls).

And if that wasn't enough, Pakistan and India in their match before the Super Eights stage played a nail-biting tie which later ended in Pakistan's defeat after a bowl-out. That's where the story of bloopers, losers and troopers started.

India had made a meagre total of 141 after Mohammad Asif ripped them apart in his opening spell taking 4 for 18 of his four overs. It was a phenomenal performance taking into the fact that Pakistan-India encounter is always a breathtaking one. All-rounder Shahid Afridi, who has been outstanding in the tournament with the ball, took two wickets in that match as well leading Pakistan to chase an easy total.

But the losing streak of the Pakistan openers -- Salman Butt and Imran Nazir -- continued again as they went cheaply. Younis Khan and wicket-keeper Kamran Akmal couldn't live up to expectations as well and were shown the way to pavilion quickly as well.

In the end, it was all left to 'trooper' Misbah-ul-Haq to lead his side to an impossible win. All-rounder Yasir Arafat came to the crease late in the innings, hit some boundaries, and released the pressure off Misbah.

Misbah, whose selection was severely criticised before the tournament started as he is an aging cricketer and his nomination to replace Mohammad Yousuf seemed to be a bogus decision, played an incredible innings then. He hit seven boundaries and a huge six in his 53-run innings.

But when he should have added another run to his tally, he faltered. He had two balls to make a run; to lead Pakistan to a famous victory but... it was a blooper! Shanthakumaran Sreesanth held his nerve and bowled two perfect last deliveries to save the match for India. Misbah, who almost became a hero, perhaps he did become one, was run out on the last ball.

The embarrassment was ahead for Pakistan, and nobody expected it to be, really. The match had to be decided by a bowl-out rule, something which Pakistan skipper Shoaib Malik didn't know of. Now how the hell in the world can a captain of a national side be so dumb that he doesn't know the rules of the tournament he is playing in? And what was the team administration, the coach doing? Didn't they know as well? Mark my words, they didn't.

It was a football World Cup scenario afterwards. Each team had five opportunities; five bowlers from each team had to bowl a delivery and hit the open stumps. Simple, isn't it? Pakistan selected Mohammad Asif, Sohail Tanvir, Yasir Arafat, Shahid Afridi and Umar Gul to do the honours.

India's selected bowlers -- Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh and Robin Uthappa -- were on target in their team's first three attempts.

For Pakistan, Arafat came and went, Gul did the same and Afridi felt the consequences. None of the first three Pakistan bowlers were able to hit the stumps. What a 'losing' scenario!

But it was the last of bad matches Pakistan played in the tournament. In the Super Eights, in their first match, Pakistan shocked tournament favourites Sri Lanka.

Batting first it was another failure for Pakistan's opening batsmen. Butt made 12 while Nazir departed after making just 7. Mohammad Hafeez, who replaced Arafat for this match, couldn't do much either. Younis and Malik came to the party, both hitting fifties. Pakistan stretched their total to 189 after late onslaught from Misbah, again, and Afridi.

This total looked easy to conquer for the Sri Lankans but they were outdone by superb Pakistan bowling. Afridi was the star of the show again, taking 3 for 18 while Gul chipped in with two wickets as well. A completely dominating performance by the Pakistanis was seen leaving the coach Lawson thinking how unpredictable a team can be.

Then there was another big match for Pakistan, against Australia this time. The Kangaroos, who were upset by Zimbabwe in the group stages, weren't in the mood to fail again. But things didn't go their way.

It was Sohail Tanvir's turn to put on the show as he took three wickets in Australia's innings. Batting first, the Australians were just able to make 164 with Brad Hodge topscoring with 36.

And yet again, the top three for Pakistan 'failed'. Butt, Nazir and Hafeez proved again that they should be dropped.

Malik and Misbah showed their potential again and their century stand was too hot to handle for the Aussies. Malik made a second consecutive fifty while Misbah, hitting the longest six of the tournament during his innings, made a 42-ball 66. Pakistan virtually sealed their semifinals spot after that win.

And the semis spot was sealed on Thursday when the team took on Bangladesh. Pakistan didn't want to lose again to their Asian counterparts as they embarrassingly did in the 1999 50-over World Cup.

But Pakistan looked off-colour in this match. Bangladesh batted first, though they didn't made a big score but their debutant batsman Junaid Siddique showed everyone how to bat in a Twenty20 game. He hammered the Pakistan pacers all over the park hitting three sixes and six boundaries in his 49-ball 71. Bangladesh were all out for 140.

It should have been easy pickings for Pakistan but Bangladesh piled up the pressure soon. Nazir was hit on his abdomen and left the field early. Afridi, promoted up the order for the first time in the tournament, thrilled the crowd with his powerful batting hitting two sixes in his 39-run innings. Rest of the batsmen, including Hafeez and Butt at last, chipped in with useful contributions but couldn't take Pakistan home. In the end, Nazir came back to bat and at last crossed the twenty-run mark to seal Pakistan's rather unimpressive four-wicket win.

The time restriction has left me able to complete a round-up of Pakistan's performance only till here. Hopefully Pakistan defeated New Zealand in their semis and will be facing either Australia or India tomorrow. It has been a dream journey for Pakistan in the tournament after their previous dismal performances and whatever happens in the future for them, one hopes there are not many 'bloopers' and 'losers' in the team and the Pakistan 'troopers' continue their impressive run.

After a very long gap, the Pakistan cricket team is apparently on the track now. The performance of the team in the Twenty20 World Cup is indeed commendable and due credit should be given to the selection committee and the management for their decisions. The heartening thing is the way young Shoaib Malik is performing as a captain, especially in the match against Australia he showed the world that he has a cool and shrewd head on his shoulders.

Prior to the tournament, the 25-year-old Shoaib Malik was surely under a lot of stress because in the past we have had a few revolts against junior captains, but so far he has managed to handle the heat very well. It was not a culture in Pakistan or India to appoint young captains but now apparently India have also taken a leaf out of Pakistan's book and named 26-year-old Dhoni as their ODI captain.

Here not praising Misbah-ul-Haq will be unfair, because he was under a lot of pressure after replacing Mohammad Yousuf, but he made the nation proud; again the selection committee should be praised.

Since Misbah is already 33 therefore hoping to see him till the next world is actually hoping against hope, hence with him we need to groom some more players to fill the gap in the absence of Inzamam, Yousuf, Younis, etc.

For the backup players the selectors should be looking at the young teams such as Pakistan A, Under-19 and the Karachi Urban team that played against the visiting Mumbai outfit.

At least two young batsmen from Karachi, Khalid Latif and Khurram Manzoor are there to be considered who have performed very well in the recent matches. Also, it is high time to bring in the rotation policy with good effect, by resting the players who have been tried and tested many a times to incorporate new players. The rotation policy will also provide us with a sufficient backup for injured or out-of-form players.

Although the Pakistan batting performed well, still we should not forget our weaknesses in the opening pair which did not provide the team with a solid platform until the Super Eights stage, therefore this area needs to be taken care of. We have tried different opening pairs since the disastrous performance in the 2003 World Cup hence this is the area where something needs to be done to secure the future.

The other problem area is the all important slot of the wicket-keeper, after Rashid Latif and Moin Khan we have only had Kamran Akmal whose form and performance is not hidden from anyone. He did miss a few chances in the Twenty20 competition but it did not cost us much hence his shortcomings were overlooked but in the longer run we need a backup for Akmal too.

This department should be handled with extra care and former greats should be consulted in this regard, in the presence of Moin and Rashid we were not facing this problem in the 1990s, thanks to the strong backup every time when one got unfit or lost his form.

In the end I would like to touch upon the unpleasant event happened prior to the Twenty20 World Cup when Shoaib Akhtar allegedly hit fellow fast bowler Mohammad Asif with a cricket bat. Words like disgraceful, disgusting and shameful are indeed not enough to describe the act of Shoaib Akhtar as one can't expect a professional cricketer to behave in this erratic rather reckless fashion.

The Pakistan Cricket Board should take stern action against the culprit, but first of all it has to find the culprit. By the look of things and the track record it seems almost certain that the bad boy of the Pakistan cricket, Shoaib Akhtar, was solely responsible for the sad event. However, the flurry of news after the spat clearly made the event a bit gloomy, some news items suggested that Shoaib Akhtar, Shahid Afridi and Mohammad Asif were involved in a debate which led to the unpredictable end.

Whatever happened, we should take into account the real cause behind the action of Shoaib Akhtar, because if it is said that every action has a reaction then every reaction must also be a follow-up of an action. I am not advocating Shoaib Akhtar but we should not jump to the conclusion before knowing the other side of the story.

Everyone knows that the career of famous football Zidane ended in a controversy as he was dismissed in extra-time of the 2006 Final for head-butting Italian defender Marco Materazzi, later it was confirmed that Zidane was provoked to an extend that he reacted in such a nasty style.

This is exactly what Shoaib Akhtar claimed that he was actually provoked and his actual quarrel was with Shahid Afridi who allegedly passed some "bad" remarks about Shoaib Akhtar's family which led to the fight with Afridi, during which Muhammad Asif got hit "unintentionally". To make matters further shabby, both Asif and Afridi rejected Shoaib's claim.

Now what to do? Whatever happened should be inspected from all angles because common sense says that no one would hit you with a cricket bat with full force unless he is either insane or something very very serious happened and led to an act of such intensity. In our own cricket history there are a few such examples when former captain Inzamam-ul-Haq beat a spectator and Shahid Afridi brandished his bat at a spectator and almost hit him. Both the incidents were results of provocations, so what was the reality in Shoaib Akhtar's case only God knows.

Pakistan cricket has been known for churning out news after news. Last week or so was not different either. There were some big stories but most importantly all of them were fantastic.

Since The Oval Test last year, anguish had become the destiny of cricket lovers in Pakistan but now for the time being we, the Pakistanis, can sit back and cherish a long-awaited purple patch. As I wrote earlier, there are some big news, so I decided to stack all these good and big news in one column here to touch all of them separately.

First Pakistani to reach such heights: The biggest of all those stories has to be Mohammad Yousuf's ICC Test Player of the Year award. It cannot get bigger than this. But the hullabaloo of the T20 overshadowed it to an extent. Scoring 944 runs at an average of 94.44 including six centuries earned him this prestigious award which is the first time for any Pakistani player to receive. He is known to be highly gifted, once in a life time kind of sportsman but the real realisation came in 2006 where he learnt the art of spending precious time in the middle.

The Indian Cricket League (ICL) episode should not keep him out of the reckoning. I believe it is a two-way traffic. The PCB is equally responsible for this kind of reaction from one of the calmest characters in our current set of players.

There has to be something terribly wrong to induce Yousuf to go for such a desperate step. He has been under the pump when it comes to leading the Pakistan side. He was first demoted from the vice-captaincy for Younis Khan, and then selected again after Younis's refusal to accept the role of a spineless skipper in the absence of Inzamam-ul-Haq and in less than 24 hours the PCB pushed Yousuf aside and reinstated Younis as captain again for the ICC Champions Trophy last year.

The 2007 World Cup opened a Pandora's box which induced Younis to abstain from accepting the captaincy after Inzamam's retirement. Yousuf again considered himself as an option, but Shoaib Malik got the nod of approval.So after so many episodes where his experience and standing were ignored, his reaction is justified to some extent. I believe his decision to join the ICL has little to do with the captaincy rather it has more to do with respect and dignity which we always fell short on when it comes to our heroes.

If the PCB had listened to his grievances, this situation could easily have been avoided. Time is still on PCB's side so it is never too late to admit one's mistakes.

Young guns: I think in all fairness, we, pseudo cricket experts meaning cricket writers and real cricket experts meaning veteran cricketers owe an apology to poor Misbah-ul-Haq. He has been ridiculed for his age without looking at what he possesses. The more I see him playing the more I feel sorry for Pakistan cricket for wasting such a gem.

The best thing about the not-so-young Misbah is his fitness and versatility. He has answers for all from spinners, faster bowlers to medium pacers. Belonging to a generation which is under the heavy influence of Javed Miandad in molding their style of play, Misbah is quite similar in his shrewdness, summing things up quickly, cheekiness and judging what is bowler thinking to great Miandad.

I think we should extend an apology to Misbah for judging things prior to giving him a deserving opportunity.

Another player who caught everybody's attention has been Sohail Tanvir. His strength has been his uniqueness. You seldom come across such a weird action in international cricket, but seldom have you come across such a baffling talent. Apart from being deceptive, Sohail is fairly clever with his variations as well. Now it is time to nurture him under the expertise of Geoff Lawson.

Cricket could be a lot better off without it: The Pakistan-India tie in Twenty20 World Championship could have been more romantically ended if that bizarre bowl-out had not happened.

Whatever it was, it was not cricket at all. The best thing that can happen to the Twenty20 format is that it never reaches the stage of bowl-out again. It is the frivolity that needs to be packed once and for all as soon as possible. If it is highly preferable to avoid a tie game then some other arrangements can be put in place, for instance playing another five or three over game where it is decided between bat and ball than relying on a mere childish affair.

Right horse to put money on: Shoaib Malik's performance as a captain and as a batsman proved that he was the right choice for the job. He seems to have nice camaraderie with the seniors as well as with the juniors which is essential to get hold of things as a leader.

The most impressive part is the way he has been handling his bowlers according to their strengths. There was a definite game-plan of using the spinners earlier before dew came into the play during the Sri Lanka match.Similarly, the decision to hold back Umar Gul, who possesses a nice control over yorkers, was a prudent decision. So far Lady Luck has been quite generous with the young skipper, maybe due to his earnest efforts to do well at the highest level. His blazing knocks against the 2007 World Cup finalist teams were an epitome of his serenity under pressure.

And lastly but not so importantly he has been doing fairly well during his interviews at presentations to please all those who don't look at our cricketers beyond their command over foreign language.

Before being appointed the permanent captain, Dravid led the country in five Tests, in the absence of the regular captain, of which he won two, lost two and drew one, Rahul Dravid surprised everyone with his unexpected decision of stepping down as skipper from the Indian cricket team last week. Dravid along with Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly had also earlier withdrawn his name from the Twenty20 squad.

As per his statement for his resignation as the captain decision, he wants to concentrate on his batting and was feeling more pressure after taking the additional responsibilities as captain that affect his batting. But cricket circles think that it's not a genuine reason.

According to reports, a source inside the Indian cricket team disclosed that except the captaincy pressure the major reason was the interference of some outside persons who wanted to dictate to Dravid what he should do and what he shouldn't as a captain, it was an important cause for Dravid's unexpected decision.

Rahul Dravid, 34, belongs to Indore, Madhya Pradesh and since taking his captaincy a Mumbai lobby started the conspiracy against him. Even chairman of selectors, Dilip Vengsarkar, also from Mumbai was not happy with Dravid for not batting at number three in the One-day Internationals. Vengsarkar expressed his displeasure and criticised him on this issue after the sixth One-day International at Lord's earlier this month, where India levelled the seven-match series 3-3.

Everybody knows that making changes in the batting order is purely a captain's decision and the management or the selectors have nothing to do with it. Specially the selectors' job is completed when once they have selected the team and handed it over to the captain.

The lobby also criticised Dravid's third and final Test decision at the Oval for having not enforced the follow-on on England and thus missing a golden opportunity of winning the series 2-0.

After receiving the resignation from Rahul Dravid the BCCI chief Sharad Pawar did not insist on his continuing with the job even till the upcoming tour of Australia in India. Instead of asking the real cause of stepping down the BCCI chief decided to "respect" Dravid's decision to quit the captaincy.

Rahul Dravid is a thorough gentleman in and outside the ground and maybe he is the only player in the Indian team who believes in the philosophy of "why not instead of why".

Two tough series are coming up for India against the world champion Australia, first in India and later in Australia. Dravid has taken a wise decision to give up the captaincy on a winning note. His batting is more important for India than his captaincy.

In October 2005, when he was appointed captain of the one-day side, he began with a thumping 6-1 hammering of Sri Lanka in a home series, and was soon given the responsibility of the Test side as well.

Before being appointed the permanent captain, Dravid led the country in five Tests, in the absence of the regular captain, of which he won two, lost two and drew one. He was a useful vice-captain for long and, during the times when Ganguly was unavailable either because of an injury or any other reason, Dravid took the responsibility.

As far as Dravid's leadership qualities are concerned he proved himself so many times in spite of the limited resources specially in the bowling department.

Dravid led the India team in 20 Tests and 62 ODIs after taking over the captaincy from Sourav Ganguly around two years back. Recently he won a Test series against England on their soil after 21 years and lost the one-day series with a very close margin of 4-3.

Under his captaincy India won eight Tests, including series wins in West Indies, Bangladesh and England. In ODIs India set a record for 16 consecutive successful chases. But the worst time came when India had a first-round exit from the World Cup in the Caribbean earlier this year. As captain, he averaged 51 in Tests and 44 in ODIs.

On the one side leading the Indian cricket team must be a dream for every Indian cricketer, but on the other hand it is one of the toughest jobs for anyone. Everyone wants to take credit for the wins but after the defeats sometimes only the captain gets the axe.

Before Dravid India's most successful captain Sourav Ganguly was thrown out of the team in a humiliating manner; before him, Sachin Tendulkar stepped down as captain in an unpleasant way. Even before that, Mohammed Azharuddin was dropped due to match-fixing charges although there was never any proof.

Dravid is lucky in this way that he quit before facing any embarrassing situation. He led the Indian cricket team for just two years. From the beginning Dravid emerged as the most dependable batsman of India and received the label of "The Wall".

Now the BCCI has appointed Mahendra Singh Dhoni in place of Dravid as skipper for the upcoming ODI series against Australia. Dhoni is already leading the side in the ongoing Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa. He was also the vice-captain on the recently concluded England tour.

For Test matches master batsman Sachin Tendulkar is the strongest candidate as captain. The selectors have nearly two months before India's Test series against Pakistan at home. India are scheduled to play 10 Tests this season. It will be the first time in India when two captains will lead the side in Tests and One-day Internationals separately.

Rahul Dravid made his Test debut along with Sourav Ganguly against England at Lord's in 1996. Both debutants made their first appearance remarkable with 95 and 131 runs, respectively.

Rahul Dravid picked up both the Test Player of the Year and the Player of the Year titles at the inaugural ICC awards ceremony at Alexandra Palace in London in September 2004. He was declared Widen Cricketer of the Year in 2000.

The September of the year 2006 was a very happy time for the Russian tennis superstar because she had won the US Open, the second Grand Slam title of her career, but this September brought her memories which she has declared as "hard to swallow:.

She is Maria Sharapova, the No 2 ranked tennis professional who ascended to fame when she became the first Russian to win a Wimbledon in 2004, dethroning two-time defending champion Serena Williams. While this marvellous victory made her the second youngest Wimbledon winner after Martina Hingis and granted her a sudden bump to stardom, she had to face, after this stunning victory, a long spell of defeats that ended in September 2006 when she could snatch her second Grand Slam title.

But this September, Sharapova was astounded by Poland's Agnieszka Radwanska when she so miserably dethroned the Russian glamour girl in the third round match at the US Open, and it was a second time in her tennis career that she failed to defend her Grand Slam title.

No doubt, the Russian jewel in the crown of world tennis has always drawn prime attention from all corners, her defeats, mostly in semis or finals, have made her a lady of bad luck. What has always attracted my attention is the fact that she is a former world number one and presently occupies the second position in the WTA international tennis ranking but has been falling victim to defeat at the hand of her far juniors.

She is an excellent player, fully dedicated to her game -- a quality rarely found among the stars beautiful like her -- but she has been losing more than winning. That Sharapova is an excellent tennis professional is proved well by her teenage victories of a number of titles including the Wimbledon and US Open Grand Slams.

She claimed her first title of 2006, and 11th of her career at the Pacific Life Open in Indian Wells, California, a Tier 1 event at which she was the third seed. Sharapova and No. 4 seed Elena Dementieva became the first Russians to reach the event's final, with Sharapova triumphing.

Sharapova claimed her second title of 2006 at the Acura Classic by defeating Kim Clijsters who was top seed that time. After the exit of the injury-hit Kim Clijsters, Sharapova entered the 2006 US Open seeded third and thrashed the then top-ranked player Mauresmo in the semifinal and second-ranked Henin-Hardenne in the final to lift her second Grand Slam title.

It was a victory long awaited. This victory also joined her with the players who have beaten the top two players in WTA ranking to win a Grand Slam. However, the list of her defeats is rather long.

Defending her Wimbledon title in 2005, Sharapova reached the semifinals without losing a set but then was well-beaten by a rejuvenated Venus Williams, resulting in an end to her winning streak on grass and her quest to dethrone Lindsay Davenport.

Sharapova rose to the No 1 ranking on August 22, 2005, that lasted for only one week, before again ascending to the No 1 status on September 12, 2005, in a virtual hide and seek with Lindsay Davenport. She was upstaged by fellow Russian teenager Dinara Safina in the quarter-finals of Russia's biggest tennis tournament.

Maria was beaten in the semifinal of the 2005 US Open by Kim Clijsters, making it a fourth time when she lost at a Grand Slam tournament to the eventual champion. Earlier, she had lost to Serena in the Australian Open, to Justine Henin-Hardenne in the French Open quarter-final and to Venus in the Wimbledon semifinal.

At the 2006 Australian Open, Sharapova lost in the semifinals to Justine Henin-Hardenne, the only match of the year that she lost after winning the first set. Sharapova lost in the final of the Nasdaq-100 Open to Svetlana Kuznetsova. Had Sharapova won the match, she would've become only the third player (after Steffi Graf and Kim Clijsters) in history to win the Indian Wells-Miami double.

At the 2006 French Open, Sharapova was eliminated in the fourth round by Dinara Safina. The Russian beauty failed to add a third successive Birmingham title to her collection, losing in the semifinals to American Jamea Jackson. She was defeated in the semifinals of Wimbledon, losing to eventual winner AmÈlie Mauresmo.

Maria played at Los Angeles, but lost to Elena Dementieva in the semifinals. In the final of Watson Water Champions Challenge, an exhibition tournament and warm-up for the 2007 Australian Open, she lost to Kim Clijsters.

In the Australian Open 2007, the top-ranked Russian darling defeated fourth-seeded Clijsters in the semifinals, but was easily defeated by Serena Williams, who was ranked 81 in the world. Her next tournament was the Pacific Life Open in Indian Wells, California, where she was the defending champion and top seed. However, she lost to Zvonareva in the fourth round after leading 5-4 in the second set.

At the Sony Ericsson Open in Key Biscayne, Florida, Sharapova again lost easily to Serena Williams, this time in the fourth round 6-1, 6-1. In her previous rounds, she had defeated Venus Williams.

After a long absence due to a shoulder injury, she made her return at the Istanbul Cup, where she lost to Frenchwoman Aravane Rezai in the semifinals. In the French Open, she reached the semifinals stage but was ousted by her far junior Ana Ivanovic with a lopsided score of 6-2, 6-1.

At the DFS Classic in Birmingham, the Russian teenager lost in the final to second seeded Jelena Jankovic. She suffered an early crash at the Wimbledon in 2007, falling victim to eventual champion Venus Williams in the fourth round.