To comprehend what Babar Azam’s ascent to the ODI rankings summit means to Pakistan, play back their last decade in international cricket. Who were their finest specialist batsmen apart from Babar? Misbah-ul-Haq was more pluck than flair. Shoaib Malik failed the Test mark by a distance, as did the ageless Shahid Afridi. And for a long time, Mohammad Hafeez merited a place in the side because he could bowl too. Meanwhile, the world got used to the next generation of talent. India have Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and now, Rishabh Pant. England have had Alastair Cook, Joe Root and Ben Stokes. South Africa had AB de Villiers and Hashim Amla. Australia have Steve Smith, David Warner and Marnus Labuschagne while New Zealand know, irrespective of the format, Kane Williamson and Ross Taylor will always show up.
Time, however, stood still for Pakistan. Forced to adopt a new home, all they could do was reminisce about the past, about Zaheer Abbas’s elegance, Javed Miandad’s shrewdness, Saeed Anwar’s cavalier opening acts, Inzamam-ul-Haq’s laidback grace, Mohammad Yousuf’s bountiful talent and the indisputable resilience of Younus Khan who was Pakistan’s last line of defence against many hostile bowling attacks for a good 15 years. Their experiments with raw talent continued in the meantime, discarding many and keeping faith in a bare few. Babar is the cream of this churn, this unforgiving hunt for the next batting great, and, more importantly, someone who can rival Virat Kohli.
Azam was all of 22 during the 2017 Champions Trophy final win against India. Two years later, he broke Miandad’s 1992 record for most runs by a Pakistan batsman in a World Cup by finishing with 474 runs at 67.61. Pakistan fell agonisingly short of a semi-final berth in 2019 but the world knew of the coming of age of Azam, courtesy one of the finest chases in the history of the game against New Zealand at Edgbaston. Under overcast skies, against the probing swing of Trent Boult, the accuracy of Mitchell Santner and Lockie Ferguson’s zipping pace, Azam was a picture of calm, bearing his time, threading the gaps and accumulating runs with conviction. “I can say that this is one of my best knocks because the aim is to be the best batsman in the world,” he said after that match-winning century.
Azam’s basics, of course, were developed playing tennis ball cricket in the bylanes of Lahore. More organised cricket in the form of training and competitive matches came later, at Model Town Park, not far from the Gaddafi Stadium where he made his debut against Zimbabwe in 2015. The Akmal brothers were his cousins but Babar still had to chart his own path, with father Azam Siddique hand holding him almost every step of the journey. In a PCB podcast chat with Azam, Imam-ul-Haq recalls how Azam’s father used to sit all day at the ground during the under-16 trials. “Even today, if you are not home by 11, he either calls you or me,” said Imam. “Abhi bhi daant parti hai, agar main galat shot kheloon (I still get a scolding when I play a wrong shot),” Azam replied. “I wasn’t allowed to go out with friends. I wasn’t happy but my father always used to say ‘you will know when you grow up’. I do now.”
The finer aspects of Azam’s batting, by his own admission, were learnt from the greats. The key was practice. “I remember Virat Kohli telling me ‘You will play in the ground the way you play at nets,” recounted Azam. For the cover drive, the most pleasing stroke to come out of Azam’s bat, he studied de Villiers. “I couldn’t be confident till I played a cover drive. Many people warned me against trying that shot early on. I struggled. But it was so natural to me that it was difficult for me to let go off. I still practise it a lot.” Further bolstering Azam’s technique was his ability to play late. This he learned from Williamson and Ijaz Ahmed. “The closer you play (to the body), the better command you exercise on that stroke. Earlier I used to play away from my body. That was a habit. Ijaz bhai used to tell me I would struggle if I kept playing on the up like that. Only after 2-3 years did I realise he was right.” You get the magnitude of what Azam has been able to pull off when you realise how much he has learned on the go. “It doesn’t happen overnight, or even in a year. I used to retreat to a shell if I failed. I started thinking negative. But I have overcome that. I keep talking to myself.”
And then there is that desire to play as much cricket as possible. When Pakistan were knocked out of the 2019 World Cup, Azam didn’t sit and mope. Instead, he opted to play a highly rewarding season of county cricket for Somerset, leading the Vitality Blast tally with 578 runs at 52.54. “There was a lot I learned there. I went after just a week’s rest at the end of the World Cup. I played 14 matches against quality opposition, and that helped quite a lot,” said Babar during the home series against Sri Lanka later. He is undeniably Pakistan’s best batsman in recent times. In the last five years, he averaged 58.18 in ODIs, only behind Kohli (75.10) and Sharma (60.82). No one has scored more runs than him in T20Is (1916 runs in 50 matches, Sharma is second with 1572 runs from 51 matches) in the last five years. He still has a long way to go in Tests to be even compared with Kohli, Root, Smith, Williamson or even Chesteshwar Pujara. But there is promise.
His role keeps evolving at the same time. From being Pakistan’s white-ball captain to leading in all formats now, Babar is now expected to be an astute manager and not let it affect his batting. It’s a task many have flunked. “I am definitely not expecting a straight line of victories as a captain. There will be ups and downs, there will be mistakes and there will be good performances,” he said in May after becoming white-ball captain. But the momentum is in favour of Azam. Pakistan have just become only the second side after Australia to twice win an ODI series in South Africa. And now, he has ended Kohli’s 41-month long stay at the top of the charts. The last time a Pakistani had topped the ODI ratings was Yousuf in 2003. It has been a long wait for Pakistan.
