The expectations around Shaheen Afridi are unfair and unrealistic

It’s October 2021 and Shaheen Afridi has the world at his feet. His new ball burst against India in Pakistan’s opening T20 World Cup fixture sets the tone for his country’s sole World Cup win over their arch-rivals in the last decade. Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul, two of India’s champion batters, are sent back to the dugout during a scintillating opening spell. The 21-year-old leans back, spreads his wings and takes in the adulation of a berserk Dubai crowd – a symbol that this new look Pakistan side are capable of upstaging India in an international game they effectively run.

Shaheen looks like he’s got it all. He charges in and finds devastating new ball movement with that perfectly cocked wrist, letting go of the ball from great height. There are no obvious flaws. He clearly relishes the big occasion and his list of attributes are so textbook that they almost look made to order. And he’s more than just a white-ball gun for hire, he’s a Test seamer of considerable promise who is just a few weeks away from climbing to third spot in the ICC Test bowling rankings.

It’s December 2023 and Shaheen Afridi is under the scanner. A so-so World Cup is followed by a tame opening Test on Perth. Waqar Younis, one of Pakistan’s Mount Rushmore quicks, warns that Shaheen is in danger of becoming little more than a medium pacer if he’s not careful.

So what’s happened? The prevailing theory is that Shaheen has still not completely recovered from two knee injuries that sidelined him for lengthy stretches last year, the first coming in the run-up to the T20 World Cup, and the second derailing their defence in the final and then keeping him off the pitch for three months afterwards. The PCB’s handling of his recovery was criticised and Afridi hasn’t exactly taken it easy since then. Even when he’s short of his perceived best, he remains a key component of Pakistan’s side in all three international formats. He also played 20 T20s in the English summer for Nottinghamshire Outlaws and Welsh Fire. The combination of a packed schedule and a recent return from injury provides a straightforward enough narrative; he has been overworked and rushed back from injury. But is it an accurate one?

The underlying numbers suggest not exactly. According to CricViz data, his average pace across formats is practically identical across formats in 2022 and 2023, before and after that knee injury. It is marginally down on his 2021 peak, when he averaged 138 kph in T20 and Test cricket. In 2023, his T20 average pace (slower balls aside) dropped to 136 kph and to 135 kph in Tests

The truth is that Afridi has never really been a bowler of express pace. Capable of breaching the 140kph mark for sure, but certainly not in the category of the sport’s fastest bowlers. There is also no discernible change in Afridi’s other underlying numbers. His current length, average seam and average swing is more or less consistent with what he produced before the knee injury.

It is worth taking stock of first not only what Afridi has already achieved in his career but also the extraordinary expectastions that are laid upon his broad shoulders. In the history of the game, Waqar and Kagiso Rabada are the only two pace bowlers to take more international wickets before their 24th birthday than Afridi’s 275. He is already 13th on Pakistan’s all-time list of international wicket-takers. His imprint on Pakistani cricket has already been seismic.

He has been Pakistan’s de facto attack leader from an absurdly early age and in Test cricket in particular, Pakistan’s bowling stocks have seen him obliged to fulfil a variety of roles that are generally incompatible with each other, simultaneously performing the function of container and battering ram. His own development has generally been secondary to the immediate needs of the team.

There is perhaps a disconnect between expectation and reality, with a narrative superimposed on Afridi to fit the scale of the moments he occasionally produces. But even in 2021, he was not the quite all-format world beater he was often made out to be. In the T20 World Cup itself, for example, he was hit for six off three consecutive deliveries by Matthew Wade to seal Pakistan’s semi-final exit. His Test numbers that year – 47 wickets at 17 – were exceptional but beneath the surface were extremely lop-sided. From six Tests against West Indies, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe, he averaged 13. In three Tests against South Africa and New Zealand, he averaged 33.

His overall Test numbers are similar. Against the lower ranked sides, Afridi is lethal and against the best, there is room for improvement – he averages more than 40 with the ball against Australia, England and New Zealand.

That’s not to say he hasn’t been an exceptional bowler for Pakistan. He remains in the very top bracket of T20 quicks and at 23 already has two decent 50 over World Cup campaigns under his belt. In Test cricket, alongside Naseem, he is indisputably one of Pakistan’s two most threatening seamers – the shame is that the pair have played just 14 Tests together in four years. There are so few genuinely world-class seamers across all three formats – Jasprit Bumrah is perhaps the only one – that falling short of that mark is no crime.

As Ravi Shastri remarked during the World Cup, Afridi is no Wasim Akram just yet and he may never be. Sportspeople don’t improve linearly. It is not uncommon for players who burst onto the scene at a young age, especially those with abnormally advanced physical attributes, to plateau earlier than others. If this is the case with Shaheen, he is still a must-pick for Pakistan in all three formats, ranks among the most threatening new ball bowlers on the planet, and, like in Dubai two years ago, is more than capable of producing great moments. The lofty expectations around him are unfair and speak more to the shortcomings in Pakistan’s production of seam bowling talent than anything else.