Tahir: I’m surprised the Afghans were so clueless

Proteas star Imran Tahir admitted he did find it surprising that Afghanistan were caught unawares by his googly as the champion leg-spinner claimed four for 29 and the man of the match award in their World Cup clash in Cardiff at the weekend.

Tahir, introduced in the 22^nd over with Afghanistan on a reasonably solid 69 for three, bowled Noor Ali Zadran through the gate with his first delivery, his standard big-turning googly.

Four balls later, Asghar Afghan was also confused by which way the ball was going and popped back an easy return catch.

Afghanistan were then in such a spin, exacerbated by excellent support from the other end by Andile Phehlukwayo, that Gulbadin Naib pulled a shortish delivery from Tahir to a leaping Aiden Markram at wide mid-on and the 40-year-old would have been particularly delighted to finish off with the scalp of fellow leg-spinner Rashid Khan.

Rashid is probably going to be the one who inherits the retirement-bound Tahir’s mantle as the best white-ball leg-spinner in the world after the World Cup and it was astonishing that the Afghanistan batsmen played Tahir so poorly given they face Rashid all the time in the nets and in this age of comprehensive analysis have plenty of information about him.

“There are a few batsmen who have not picked my googly in my career, but Afghanistan have two or three guys who have played all over the world and Rashid Khan probably has the best googly in the world, so I was surprised that they weren’t picking it.

“But it’s a tricky first ball to land and I was really pleased with the way it came out. Bowling wicket-to-wicket was just my role and waiting for the batsman to make a mistake. There was not much happening out there and the googly was the only one turning, so I realised that was the delivery for wickets,” Tahir said after leading South Africa to a morale-boosting nine-wicket win.

While it is easy to take Tahir’s outrageous natural talent for granted given his superb consistency, he put his success in conditions that would not seem to suit spin-bowling down to pure old-fashioned hard work in the days leading up to the Cardiff match, where the Sophia Gardens pitch was more a green seam bowler’s paradise and the short straight boundaries definitely counted against the slow bowlers.

“The boundaries are short straight here so I really practised towards that this week, I wanted to make sure the batsmen had to play me square. I’m pleased it went well, but I don’t take anything for granted. Every game is special for me, I treat it like my last game. I’m still working hard, especially because the fitness levels of this team are very high and I don’t want to look bad in the field.

“It’s very important to me that I play my best cricket at this World Cup and I will be very pleased if I can finish on top of my game. Ever since I started playing, I wanted to go away from the game with respect. I could stick around for another year or two, but there are more spinners around now who need their opportunity. It will be good for them to get a chance now,” Tahir, who has already announced he is retiring after the World Cup, said.

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