Rashid Khan -The Best Cricketer of the Week

I feel that some players are built for certain situations. Your Jos Buttlers and your AB De Villiers love a protracted T20 tournament. Your Simon Harmers and your Jeetan Patels love a sprawling long form tournament. Rashid Khan enjoys a short intense burst of cricket against high class international opposition. It is here where he excels. And excel he has this week as he has picked up 405 points across his three games in the Asia Cup - a tournament where his team has impressed by matching the big boys stroke for stroke. A rare treat for Afghanistan fans was when Rashid gave everyone a reminder that his first discipline was with the bat as he motored to 57* against Bangladesh. This, coupled with 7 wickets across three games, has put him head and shoulders above the rest this week both overall and in terms of his Asia Cup compatriots. Shakib Al Hasan finishes third this week but with nearly half the amount of Rashid's points whilst Ravi Jadeja, who began the week playing for Saurashtra, picked up 5th place with one amazing performance against Bangladesh when called up at short notice. Interestingly only one of these three have moved position on the overall table; Rashid remains in third but moves closer to Patel in second, Shakib infinitesimally narrows the canyon between tenth and eleventh whilst Jadeja overtakes Mitchell Marsh to claim nineteenth. 

The mystery of Sunil Narine continues. Throughout the year I have mentioned the disproportion between the West Indian spinners performances in the IPL and his performances elsewhere. Clearly a spinner is likely to thrive in Indian conditions but for a player that has also become a powerful T20 opener off the back of that tournament, his dip in form with the bat has been equally inexplicable. In his 16 games for Kolkata this season, Narine got 17 wickets and 357 runs - averaging just over a wicket every match (obviously) and 22.3 with the bat. Fast forward to the CPL where Narine is performing in home conditions and at some of the exact same grounds where he started the year with some exceptionally fine fifty over performances for Trinidad and Tobago. Here he is averaging 5.5 across his 12 games and has got a mere 8 wickets. This has gained him just 436 points across the course of the tournament. I have no answer as to why this drop in form is so stark. It cannot be conditions otherwise he would be a flop in the Regional Super50 competition. It can't be big crowds pumping him up in the IPL because the CPL hasn't been doing too badly in those respects this year. It will have to remain a mystery. 

And there there is George Bailey. People remember George Bailey with the sort of misty nostalgia that one considers ones youth. A transient thought that will occasionally drift into view as you fall asleep. More of a concept than an actual Cricketer. This all changed this week when George Bailey, a figure many considered mythological, rose again and actually played cricket. With a bat and ball and everything. Bailey last featured in our league in Week 13 and has had a laconic 24 weeks off. For such a long period away from the game, the Tasmanian didn't look too shabby in his two games on his way to 81 points in the week, the highlight being an 18 ball 25 batting at 5 versus Victoria. This has seen him break the 700 point threshold. For frame of reference JP Duminy was the first to break 700 in Week 5 and our leader, Simon Harmer, followed suit in Week 8. Bailey is now 638 points away from Steve Smith in 23rd place - a player who broke into the 700s in Week 13. Bailey better hope for a phenomenal Australian Summer.