Stop a local on the streets of Dublin, Belfast, or Skibbereen and ask them if they can name a member of the Irish cricket team. The likely answer will be a shake of the head and a shrug, with perhaps a slight recognition that Irish cricket is now a ‘thing’, and that perhaps there is a team doing ‘something’ in some corner of the world.
Misbah ul Haq was never going to be Pakistan’s hero. The Universe, the Stars, the Oceans and the Mountains had all conspired against him. Pakistan lives vicariously through its heroes, so they need to see them do heroic things physically, like change the course of the wind or make the mountain come to him.
Perhaps he didn’t turn out to be quite as good a batsman as his early career suggested he might become, but John Crawley certainly wasn’t helped by the way England teams were selected in the 1990s. In this feature Martin looks back at a career that might have disappointed at times, but which contained its share of highlights.