Intikhab Alam is the manager of the Pakistan team. He is 74 now but there is spring in his step and sparkle in his eye. He is a familiar figure, who has been involved with Pakistan cricket for six decades as a player in 47 Tests, a coach/manager on numerous expeditions (including the 1992 World Cup victory) and as a diplomat.
It was a delight to see him at Taunton last week, where he reminisced about the contrasting challenges of bowling to Viv Richards and Geoffrey Boycott and of listening to Pat Pocock during his 12-year spell with Surrey. As he left I wished him a peaceful tour. He smiled impishly. “Thank you. Let us hope so.”
The last two tours of England by Pakistan have provoked many adjectives. “Peaceful” has never been one of them. The scene is set for a fascinating series and we need one after the one-sided nature of the matches against Sri Lanka. But a few fingers are crossed; for this tour it has to be third time lucky.
Back in August 2006 the last Test of the series was at The Oval. This was in the far-off days when I wrote exclusively (well, sort of) for the Observer. So on the Sunday of that match I had retreated west and was mowing the lawn when my wife, hardly an expert in these matters, interrupted me with news that “there’s something funny going on at The Oval”.
Pakistan, led by Inzamam-ul-Haq, had refused to return to the field after the tea interval and an interruption for bad light. Earlier in the afternoon umpire Darrell Hair had awarded the England side, struggling to save the Test, five penalty runs. The conclusion had to be that Hair and his silent partner, the West Indian Billy Doctrove, had decided that Pakistan had tampered with the ball.
Once play had stopped and the Pakistan players had a chance to gauge the implications of the five-run penalty the team, to use the phrase of Shahryar Khan, the PCB chairman, was “aggrieved, upset and insulted” at the accusation of cheating.
Of course this incident should not have culminated in the abandonment of the match with England awarded victory. Within half an hour of Pakistan’s refusal to return to the field everyone at The Oval was eager to resume the game with one or two exceptions. Hair insisted the match was over and the taciturn Doctrove presumably agreed with him.
A few people might have admired Hair’s dogged determination to stick to the letter of the law – until they learnt that in the wake of the furore he made an offer to the ICC to retire for a one-off payment of $500,000. No one was quite sure whether Pakistan would turn up for the subsequent ODIs – but they did.
It took until 2009 for the match to be awarded to England, having previously been decreed “abandoned”.
Worse was to follow, as they say, in 2010. At Lord’s there was an astonishing Test even before controversy intruded. England were reduced to 102 for seven in their first innings; at one point Mohammad Amir had taken four wickets for no runs in eight balls. Then Jonathan Trott and Stuart Broad added 332 for the eighth wicket. This had to be remembered as “Broad’s match”. It was not.
This time I was still in town, having a drink with Jonathan Agnew on Saturday night when we heard rumours of some sort of fixing scandal. I dutifully rang the Observer, cheerfully signing off with “thought I’d better let you know something’s up but I don’t suppose it will amount to much”. Then the News of the World was published, with its story of the scam and pre-ordained no-balls.
The Pakistan effort disintegrated at Lord’s. England recorded their most uncelebrated victory. The presentations were held in the Long Room with Giles Clarke, the ECB chairman, handing over the Pakistan man-of-the-series award to Amir without a handshake or a glance in his direction. No one was quite sure whether England would turn up for the subsequent ODIs. They did and an ill-tempered series ensued.
There is more optimism in 2016. Misbah-ul-Haq, who replaced Salman Butt as Test captain, has kept a steady hand on the tiller since then. His leadership of a team in enforced exile and with the stain of fixing forever lingering, has been exceptional. On the England side there sits at the top Andrew Strauss, who was captain in both those controversial Tests, another sensible man who will want to ensure a series in which the cricket takes centre stage.
And then there is Intikhab, the smiling diplomat of Pakistan cricket, to dispense a bit of wisdom. What can possibly go wrong?
