Pakistan Cricket and World Cup 2015

This is perhaps the weakest Pakistani team participating the cricket world cup campaign. We all saw amazingly super test performances of Pakistan against Australia in the UAE which seem to be a good run into the World cup. But unfortunately after Ahamd Shehzad’s head injury and second test against New-Zealand, this team now appears to be going nowhere. Numerous injuries, doubtful selections and bad performances in the New-Zealand keep our chances at the lowest during the upcoming ICC cricket world cup, 2015.

Selection Question marks??? Omission of Fawad Alam was the greatest disappointment and left many around the world stunned. This Guy fails to satisfy selectors even after impressive performances at domestic and International level. His safe and handy approach towards batting makes him among the ranks of Misbah as most reliable batsmen. He can be a useful bowler as well along with safe pair of hands in the field. My personal feeling is that Azhar Ali should have been considered due to his cool head and reliable performances. The inclusion of above players would have had much more stability within team Pakistan‘s middle order and greater chances to play 50 overs respectfully.

Ehsan Adil is yet another shocking selection by the selection committee instead  of Sohail Tanveer who has more experience and exposure. Taking Bilawal Bhatti to New-Zealand is also beyond my comprehension. His dreadful bowling performances are self-explanatory to give him some more time before getting further chances at international stage.

Chucking Issues, A Setback to team Pakistan: The timing of chucking issue is very important which forced three of the world’s top ten bowlers out of the World cup including Saeed Ajmal and Muhammad Hafeez from Pakistan’s side. Many circles in Pakistan have a feeling that like many other past incidents, it’s an effort to hurt Pakistan’s world cup chances. ICC should implement such regulations in a manner which could provide a sense of rationale and equality if they want to establish credibility in the hearts of millions of cricketing fans around the world.

Traditional Approach, Main Weaknesses: We have to rise above the typical 90’s strategy which have no place in today’s fast moving world cricket. We see lot of records broken these days due to proactive and smart approach towards the game. Teams like India and Australia are never afraid of chasing and for Pakistan chasing even 200 becomes a limping scenario. Our batting stability is one main issue in which our set batsmen gets out irresponsibly rather than going for a big score. Even if we somehow manage to get a good partnership at the top order, fall of 2-3 quick wickets leave us in tatters. Such issues need to be addressed and resolved sooner rather than later.

Importance of Pakistan’s World Cup Campaign: Pakistan Cricket has fallen down largely in the past 10 years. Increasingly bad Law and Order situation of the country keeps foreign teams at arm’s length and we have to play our home series in UAE. Pakistan players are always victimized by the ICC be it the matter of giving code of conduct sentences or banning the players. Foreign media specially English and Indian media always find something wrong within our ranks and try to degrade us by all means like spot fixing issue. This is a big time to respond to all this; we have greater objectives and points to prove rather than just having it as yet another sports event.

Cricket Integrating the Nation: Last time in 2011 world cup, we saw total unity and glee amongst the Pakistan nation for almost a good one month. Players were praised for their fighting performances despite losing the semi-final. Our nation still has craze and passion for cricket as ever before; they want to see the guys fighting for the dignity of green flag. This is a big time to raise and provide some fun and ‘Khushi’ to our depressed nation.

Key Factor: Being brave and attacking is the only way I see if Pakistan is to make any progress in this world cup. It’s better to lose playing aggressive cricket rather to be extra cautious and get embarrassed. We have also seen in past where ordinary teams from Pakistan have performed so well whenever they played their natural game without fear and that’s what team Pakistan fans around the world would like them to do; i.e. to play their natural game and give extremely tough time especially to the Big Three of ICC.

Way Forward: Despite of all the misfortunes discussed above, there is no lame excuse of not having a backup eleven to be brought in case of and surprised injuries and omissions. It requires sincerity and detailed planning to develop long term & backup strategy. Keeping your players up to date and having a preemptive eye on the player’s styles to avoid shocks like Saeed Ajmal & Muhammad Hafeez. Selection on merit and keeping national interest at the top will always give good results as drawing room politics will always reflect bad performances in the ground.

Gone are the days when we were most excited and praised team in the world having a capacity to shock anyone on the given day; but still, we as a nation all support them. Hoping to get a wholehearted Pakistan performance to rock the ICC cricket world cup 2015 and lift the whole nation…

Can “Freedom of Speech” be left unrestrained???

Can it be left unchecked??? Does it really exist???

Has Charlie Hebdo and Co. expressing THE Peak of Civilization OR Worst tide of Human Values?

As a reaction to the Paris attacks on Charlie Hebdo’s office on 7^th January, 2015; the paper again published blasphemous images of our beloved Prophet (S.A.W.) on 14^th January, 2015 in response to all of this today we see anger, protests and opposition against this in the whole Muslim world. Charlie Hebdo did this in the name of freedom of speech and we see alot of people supporting this thinking. However, living in such a modern age, I think everyone would question rationale and logic behind this irresponsible and disrespectful freedom of speech.

The first thing came in my mind after knowing all this was the Hadith of Prophet (S.A.W.) that “None of you becomes a believer until I am dearer to him than his children, his parents and all mankind.” (as reported by Bukhari and Muslim) Some versions add: “his life, his wealth and his family”. (Ref#1)

What would be our reaction if someone makes such cartoons of our father, mother or any other loved one? Obviously most of us will react and try to stop the one doing this and perhaps will keep such offender at arms length for the whole life… This is not the first time Charlie Hebdo did this thing; every now and then, they try to test our nerves by provoking us. But the question is Why do we only  wake up on the provocation, what are we doing in between? How can we as Muslims ever forget this insult without getting all this to a final conclusion? If it’s not taken to justice and fixed for good; it will raise its head every now and then and may well be case of horrific clash of civilizations…

Can “Freedom of Speech” be left unrestrained???

This kind of “Freedom of Speech” should really be rephrased as “Freedom of Hate” because this does not mean anything except spreading uneasiness among others. Knowingly that Prophet (S.A.W) is such a Noble role model for Muslims; what sanity is this to target the emotions of such a huge population of the world? What sort of Freedom is this which allows you to provoke about 25% of the world’s population whenever you want?

Everything in the World be it the working of this Universe, evolving human breed, any good social system, any machinery or the inter-relation of all these elements; all have immense discipline and certain boundaries attached to them. We have also seen the destructive results of undue interference in these systems.

Freedom of speech/expression; like any other thing in the world society;  have limitations. I strongly believe that our words and actions in world society must not provoke hate towards certain communities. How can you hurt someone’s sacred emotions in the name of this freedom? Is this what we have achieved in the long journey of mankind???

Does it really exist?

“Freedom for the Powerful” is another good alternative name I would suggest for such Freedom of Speech. We see captivated lands of Kashmir and Palestine and the condition of UN resolutions on these issues. The powerful countries use their powers to stop anything going in favor of these issues. Why these big guns can not allow (and support) these captivated people to express and achieve their desires of freedom?

We saw the deleted post of Hamza Ali Abbasi from facebook on this Issue and then the stream of debate on that post related to Freedom of Expression. Hamza bro, you most rightly exposed Gaps in facebook and their dual standards. Bravo!

And

honestly, true freedom of speech does not exist today. It’s just a fashion (or tool) used by the liberals/powerful to pave their interests.

And Yes…Blood also has Class Difference!

More than 40 head of states visited France to show their solidarity with French people. Worthy to mention this was the biggest million march in the history of France carrying people from all religions and nationalities. However, it’s an utmost irony that these people did not reacted to even half an extent when there were sabotage attacks in Pakistan targeting our religious and national trademarks, Malaysian plane disappearance/crash, when Freedom flotilla got attacked OR when Muslims were massacred in India and Myanmar.

So, what is the difference between French blood and others? This is a big shame for this so called developed and civilized world. You gathered in Unity with France? Who will stand in Unity for the halted emotions of 1.6 Billion Muslims? Why you kept quiet when blasphemous images were first published, why this satirical paper was not regularized at that time? Why it can not be held accountable now???

Accountability for Charlie Hebdo; responsibility of Pakistani Media…

Like many other such sabotages (like Ajmal Kassab drama in India), the Charlie Hebdo  attacks were also questioned as false Flag operations to gain greater objectives out of it; even from the BBC(This BBC video has been removed due to a breach of the Terms of Use, Kiya Smjhay???)…Unfortunately, our media did not raise its voice duly and did not work on probability of a false flag operation. We can show programs with utmost research and re-enactment, why can not we air programs on these incidents which take dignity of Muslim world at stake?

Also our media can carry out such programs in which the true image of Islam is depicted. The need to time is to clarify the misconceptions about Islam in the minds of people specially relating to the Western world who think Islam is something like ISIS and TTP. Realize your duty in these times; this will be a great Jihad against the hypocritical media around the world trying to corner out Muslims.

Missing Muslim leadership

Many of the Muslim head of states condemned Charlie Hebdo attacks and Blasphemous images thereafter, but we felt real lack of unity among Muslims leadership.  This is a real pity sight to see Muslims in such a weak state. Today, another Noor-ud-din Zangi (a dignified Muslim Hero who safeguarded Roza-e-Rasool,S.A.W. in 557 Hijri; Ref#2) is awaited to stand stern against this blasphemy and attack on beloved prophet (S.A.W.)

Future of this Freedom!

After too much of freedom exercise on Social media, we see countries making laws to regularize the mouth of expression. If the social media can be controlled by governments then why not such hated papers? We are most certainly not heading in right direction. This difference of thought on blasphemy may well erupt on an un-controllable scale. Like explained above, there must be some boundaries on Freedom of Expression/speech. Morality needs to be placed well above all Freedoms. Governments of such newspapers must review what’s happening in their countries in the name of Freedom of Speech. All such is actually resulting in Freedom to spread Hate and creating mis-understanding between various faiths…

To all supporters of Charlie Hebdo and Co: “You stood as “I am Charlie” after Paris attacks, when will you realize human emotions of Muslims related to their beloved prophet (S.A.W.) and stand by them as “I am Human???”

References:

1)http://www.themodernreligion.com/prophet/prophet_love-shafaat.html

2)http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2766j5_waqya-noor-ud-din-zangi-r-a-k-khawab-ka_lifestyle