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December 25, 2006

The Indian Team Management has decided to send back Irfan Pathan back home to rediscover some of his lost bowling form. The management which also included the Chairman of Selectors, Dilip Vengsarkar has felt that the 22-year-old left arm pacer had hardly any role to play in the coming two Tests so it was better off him to be back in India to represent his state, Baroda.

Irfan Pathan will play for Baroda in two Ranji Trophy matches in the coming days. Although his international career started in a spectacular fashion, he could never really could sustain it in the recent past due to the lost sting in his pace and his swing which was his primary weapon had deserted him often. Pathan did have a great moment at the start of 2006 when he had taken a hat-trick in the first over of a test match against Pakistan in Karachi. He became only the second Indian bowler to take a test match hat-trick but that was all he could in that match as well as the entire season. For sometime, his role in the team came under scrutiny and it has been a big loss to the team that their potentially match winning player has sunk to a very low confidence level. In the three ODIs he had played on this South African tour, the left armer had picked up just a wicket besides getting thrashed for 136 runs having bowled 21 overs. He did become the first player in the squad to register a century on this tour, which he did at Potchefstroom against Rest of South Africa which did enhance his chances of finding a berth in the Test side. But the pounding he had received, none for 74 in 11 overs against an invitational side from Kwazulu-Natal confirmed that he had better be off the party and get back home to rework on his bowling.

The Indian Skipper, Rahul Dravid has said that it was in best interests of Irfan Pathan that he is being flown back to India and that there was not much of bowling opportunities on the current tour. According to the skipper, Irfan doesn't have any more role to play here but he would be a key member once the two home series against West Indies and Sri Lanka kick off in the new year.

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