Pakistan’s top three players attended the court hearing at Doha, and between Mohammad Amir, Mohammad Asif and Salman Butt, as delineable through their appearances there looked an evident confusion between the verbal, logical, analytical, visual, intuitive, holistic and cognitive functions. The decisions were deferred until February 5, and it is evident that bans for the three ‘tainted’ players are on the table. Debunking Butt and Asif wouldn’t make a difference, salvaging Amir could be essentially logical. Amir isn’t merely a prodigally talented Pakistan fast bowler but a rare high quality international product who could be a genuine superstar. Abysmally, he wasn’t tutored or given the ‘right’ advice; his seemed a clear cut case of ‘bad precedence’ and ‘perilous influence’.

Amir, if penalised would have to carry the stigma all throughout his life; none tried tutoring him the hazards of being part of a phenomenal module as early as eighteen years of age. It is a neurological fact that the brain of high pedigreed sportsman is divided into two completely separate hemispheres. Each hemisphere processes information differently. Generally, the left brain processes information in a series. It thinks in language. It works linearly and methodically. The right hemisphere processes information in parallel. It thinks in mental images. It sees the big picture.

In Amir’s case, as it is with a plethora of high quality sportsmen, his right brain was not configured by the people who were nurturing him as he stepped into the intense and highly competitive world of international cricket. It isn’t really about the morality that develops at home and in the blood, it is about the work ethics and the culture that a newcomer has to adapt as he sees the glitterati he comes in contact with; in Pakistan team’s case who was the real role model that he could emulate; Shahid Afridi (twice caught cheating), Younis Khan (relinquishing captaincy twice in his attempts to accentuate power), Mohammad Asif (twice caught accused of doping and for possessing contraband substance in his valet) or Salman Butt mingling with a suspicious upstart acting as a player-agent. How could Amir see the ‘big picture’?

I am pretty sure, keeping in perspective my experiences with the school, college, university, club, city association, regional and even the Pakistan teams, Amir like so many other flamboyant youthful and spectacularly talented cricketers would have only been advised about the straightening of the arm, pivot and the jump or at most about strategies and tactics to use in his bowling but not a minute spent on character building. When it comes to morality, we must know a dim bulb seldom lights up the corner office, even if the player is extremely bright. If he could understand what morality could add to his cricket, he should have been able to figure out what to do. It seemed that Amir, unfortunately, exceedingly bright also had an exceedingly warped sense of what character and spirit of cricket was all about. Unwarping his mind shouldn’t have been difficult though it is a fact that in a denigrating society morality isn’t commons sense; nor is it easy to learn.

Ironically, when Amir joined the Pakistan team it was already in a mess; badly captained and the PCB horrendously governed. The only brand was presumably Shoaib Akhtar with a strong perception but he wasn’t at his prime, just a passenger car being sold under a tag of a supersonic. It seemed he was on the brink of being parked in history’s garage. Where were the role models? It was simply a question of two different takes to every deal. There was a morality take and a cricketing take; when he picked his first haul of five wickets in Tests, it was a landmark initially hailed as a blueprint of the global fast bowling industry. It sounded like a typical left brain cricketing take. Where was the morality? Tampered, masked or brazenly ignored?

Amir’s early history illustrates a young gangling boy, uncouth and raw travelling from his birth place Gujar Khan where he was born on April 13th, 1992 exactly nineteen days after Pakistan had annexed the Benson & Hedges World Cup at Melbourne. He arrived at the Bajwa Academy run by Asif Bajwa of the Rawalpindi Division Cricket Association. Availing the boarding and lodging facility, Amir was spotted as being one of the outstanding blokes. He was instantly introduced to the Rawalpindi U-19s, intuitively, that didn’t make investment sense. It didn’t make cricketing sense, either. Why Amir’s early introduction to domestic cricket was referred to as a disaster; it wasn’t about his prowess and ‘zip’. True enough, but as cricketing people would point out, unrestrained and stupendous talent and the merger with frail schooling and meek moral development could destroy this brand; it happened exactly like that.

On November 6th, 2008 Amir made his first class debut for the Federal Areas versus North West Frontier Province at the Arbab Niaz Stadium. Two glittering off-drives towards the end of the innings plus a solitary wicket wasn’t really the start expected from him; he was only 16 years old. In his second match, his first in the Quaid-i-Azam Trophy representing National Bank of Pakistan against the Habib Bank at the National Bank of Pakistan Sports Complex Ground in Karachi, as by default I was there, I saw him bowling at a blistering pace, with an angle that was slightly awkward, the slant and lateral movement, the rare in swinger though his palm was straight, an unwanted flexion of wrist during delivery still he had in him something exceptional. He wrecked Raffatullah Mohmand and Younis Khan in his first spell and returning just after tea, he added two more wickets (Fahad Masood & Danish Kaneria) ending with 4-20 in 11.5 overs (4 maidens).

So much happened to him so quickly and on tour to Kenya with the Pakistan ‘A’ team he wasn’t really appreciated for his binges and bunking out, late nights etc; in spite of a mention in the manager’s report, he still graduated to the senior Pakistan team and made his debut in Test against Sri Lanka at Galle. He bowled stunningly picking wickets of Warnapura, Kumar Sangakkara and Tilakeratne Dilshan in the first innings plus wickets of Paranavitana, Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene in the second to complete an auspicious entry into Test cricket.

The next two Tests brought him down to zero, wicket-less in four completed innings. Mediocrity prevailed in New Zealand but over to the neighbourhood, and brazen battering in the first innings, Amir rhythmically ripped Australia apart ending with 14-6-79-5 (Ricky Ponting, Michael Hussey, Michael Clarke, Marcus North and Brad Hiddin) all recognised top tier batsmen.

Amir was there to stay. And in his last of the fifteen Tests he devastated England at Lord’s ending with 28-6-84-6 (including two controversial No-Balls). Ending with 51 wickets at 29.09 with 3 x 5WI, enough for Michael Holding to cry in a show, deeply emotional of why it had happened to Amir, naive, youthful and spectacular. Not only Holding but 180 Million people of Pakistan weep as the ICC tribunal is set to penalise him, certainly sure to be absent from the World Cup 2011. We shouldn’t mourn, we must not defy but define reality?

When the Pakistan cricket team winds up its ongoing series against New Zealand on February 5, Cricket World Cup 2011 would be just fourteen days away. Though Pakistan will play their opening match of the World Cup against Kenya on February 24 at Hambantota International Cricket stadium with a much expected win, yet any prediction by cricket pundits can fall short of expectations due to intensity and pressure of the mega tournament.

Leading sport psychologists put the outcome of any competitive game on seven basic elements, namely; the correct selection of team, physical and mental toughness of players, highest level of skill, thorough understanding of opposition, best exploitation of given situation, leadership qualities of the captain and the coach and the team peaking at the right moment. An unfortunately, our preferred element of ‘luck’ has been outrightly discarded.

Mental fitness in the field of sport psychology is an intricate and a highly specialised area. It emerged as a specialised field during 20th century with the dedicated work of Coleman Robert Griffith and flourished as a specialised discipline during the decades of 70s and 80s. Pakistan sports in general and Cricket in particular is in dire need of genuine and qualified sport psychologist that can work on player’s mental side beyond skills.

When Pakistan takes on tough competitors like Australia, Sri Lanka and New Zealand in Group A of the World Cup, the pressure will be on!

The players are trying hard to shed away their match-fixing image, drug abuse scandals and internal rifts of captaincy and conflicts with the management. No one knows what strategy PCB will adopt to counter this perplexed situation and how the players and touring management committee will face and respond to these challenges internally and externally. Will the PCB media management team come up with a proactive strategy to neutralise the hostile media or every thing will be left to chance once again, for yet another international embarrassment.

Most Pakistani cricketers hail from humble backgrounds with poor education and thus their psychological and mental training has become even more laborious and painstaking.

Dr Shane Murphy a leading sport psychologist who is currently a professor at Western Connecticut State University and who had been a sport psychologist with USA Olympic team at 1988 summer games in Seoul and the fellow of the Association for Advancement of Applied Sport Psychology (AAASP) states in his book on sport psychology that, "After 20 years of experience as a sport psychologist, I’m still surprised at how little most people know about the field".

Without the services of a qualified sport psychologist, the team is likely to undergo a similar experience as of 2007 it went through a tough physical training camp at Abbottabad before the inaugural ICC World Twenty20 tournament in South Africa. The team experienced a wonderful physical training period however there was no qualified sport psychologist to look after the mental aspects of training.

The results were obvious; the team reached the final but lost to India after a thrilling encounter because the players succumbed under pressure due to lack of mental fitness, a long standing issue amongst all sports of Pakistan.

Though no one can guarantee success in sports, but the systematic application of scientific approaches such as sport psychology and exercise physiology over the months gives athletes the best opportunity to succeed. The basics of sport psychology include development of visualisation techniques, positive imagery, relaxation, affirmation and development of psych skill packs for the individual athletes. Thus the guiding force in sport psychology is an approach called ‘cognitive-behavioral psychology’ that requires months of laborious work with teams and individual players.

Sport psychology is a full-time devotion and sports bodies in Pakistan including PCB should acquire services of established sport psychologist who should develop performance rituals, help the team in reducing competitive anxiety, manage their stress levels, enhance confidence, create intrinsic motivation, bring improvement in the concentration of players, help athletes in rehabbing from injury and build team work.

We have already made bad choices in the past like appointing Jeff Lawson instead of Dave Whatmore as national coach that resulted in disaster. Let us not hand over the team for a couple of days to a novice or self proclaimed sport psychologist as it may prove to be counter productive for the team. However the requirement of a full time and qualified sport psychologist for the national cricket team is now the need of hour.

We all hope and wish that the Pakistan team peaks at right time and performs at its optimum potential in the coming world cup. The team must remember that mind is the athlete: the body is simply the means it uses to run faster, field smarter, hit harder and bowl quicker.

sdfsports@gmail.com

Football has always been a very popular game in our country; especially in Karachi where there were several football clubs in the past. Renowned footballers participated in various tournaments which were held on regular basis. Not only tournaments were organised but there used to be All Pakistan Tournaments in which players from other parts of the country participated.

After the advent of Pakistan, regular tournaments were staged at Sindh Madrassa ut Islam and later the scene shifted to KMC stadium near Urdu College behind Civil Hospital. This stadium with little facilities continued to be the venue of various tournaments and coaching camps. But the local Football Association continued to press the local authorities and Pakistan Football Federation to provide Karachi with stadia so that players could use them to perfect their art.

In the past, Karachi produced number of leading footballers but they did not get any international exposure. This is reason when a Polish Football team visited Karachi for a match, staged at YMCA football ground in the early fifties, the team suffered heavy defeat by over seven goals.

Thereafter efforts were not made to improve the standard of the game and only it was played by football clubs and by some college teams. There was a need to give the players exposure so that they could show their worth in national and international contests.

Half-hearted measures were not beneficial and some of our leading players retired unsung. Luckily, during the last few years, efforts have been made by PFF under the leadership of Faisal Saleh Hayat in lifting the morale and standard of the players.

Several years ago, a couple of stadia were constructed, one of which is situated on Mauripur road opposite Wazir Mansion Railway stadium. This is a stadium with all the facilities and is used for top-level tournaments.

Since taking over the reins of the federation, the former federal minister has exerted lot of pressure and has taken measures which have provided the players with new avenues. Not only their respect and value has been established but measures have also been taken to provide the footballers sustenance and jobs so that they can pay full attention to improve their game.

The Federation has also ventured into an area which in the past was not considered feasible, notably the hiring of a foreign coach. These efforts have bore fruit and the players have shown a lot of promise and have given a much improved performance.

This augurs well for the future of the game which is the most popular sport in the world.

The recently concluded World Cup is ample proof of that and above all, it is poor man’s game -- all that is needed is a football, shoes and a playground.

Faisal has been able to involve FIFA in getting support and facilities for the game in Pakistan which is really very heartening and speaks of his interest.

FIFA has provided funds to the PFF as a result of those efforts and footballers are much better off than they were in the past.

If this interest is sustained, I am sure that Pakistan football will emerge as one of the leading contender in Asia if not the world.

arshadshami@yahoo.com