Aziz playing it straight for UAE cricket at World Twenty20 qualifer

ABU DHABI // On the day he was about to be reported for the second time in his career for a suspect action, Nasir Aziz talked about the first time he was called with the indifference of a man who has possibly seen worse things in life.

The UAE off-spinner was first called for his action in April 2011, after taking three wickets in a World Cricket League final win over Namibia in Dubai. He was cleared soon after though, an intensive session in front of the ICC’s man on bowling actions, Dayle Hadlee.

“They didn’t specify that my action was suspect for a specific delivery, like the doosra or the off-break,” Aziz said.

“They just said they suspected it. Then Dayle Hadlee at the ICC got me to warm-up for an hour, saw the action and said there is nothing there. They put cameras up and I was told to bowl 15 doosras, 15 off-breaks, the straighter ones and there was nothing there.

“I was cleared.”

He says he was “a little disturbed because I had played for so long without any issues”, but spoke of it as a mild, passing headache.

Then after the UAE’s first match in these qualifiers, where he took two cheap wickets in a comfortable win over Uganda, he was called again.

A week later, he was cleared again.

And just as two years ago, he bowled in the interim as if without a care in the world.

He is the joint-leading wicket-taker for the UAE with 10 wickets so far, and his captain Khurram Khan confirmed the lack of stress Aziz was feeling about it all last week: “It’s not affected him at all. He’s been bowling superbly throughout and it has kind of cleared his mind.”

There remains, as the UAE take on the Netherlands on Wednesday in a game that could see them clinch a place at the World Twenty20 in Bangladesh next year, the promise of more crucial ones to come.

All this for a man who is essentially an accidental off-spinner.

Much of Aziz’s early career in Karachi was as a batsman who bowled occasionally, called on to break partnerships.

At U19 and district level he batted because, more often than not, there were better spinners in the side.

It was only at the famed Rashid Latif Cricket Academy (which churns out a very particular kind of toughened Karachi cricketer) that he began to develop his off-spin. Mentoring came from good friend, club teammate and domestic heavyweight Atif Maqbool.

Once he moved to the UAE in 2006, however, he switched emphasis and found success as a typically Pakistani off-spinner of the modern, post-Saqlain Mushtaq era: a shuffling run, the doosra as essential weapon and designed for limited-overs success.

He has flowered since, an integral part of what success the UAE have had across formats and a real threat on these surfaces.

“I picked up a lot from Atif in Karachi,” he said. “He was the main influence on my bowling and I have picked up things here. I met Saeed Ajmal recently and he also talked to me about things.”

Now there is a chance to bowl on the biggest stage of all and Aziz is, well, pretty grounded about that too. “I will say, chances are great for us. These are our conditions, we know the wickets, they are in our favour. We will give it our best shot.”

osamiuddin@thenational.ae

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