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After Afridi starred in the Pakistan’s victory in the first Odi, there was a headline in all the major Pakistani newspapers “Responsible Afridi wants to win more”. Nobody knows how to manage the media better than Shahid Afridi in Pakistan team, the guy knows the art to sell himself, he knows when to speak and when to stay quite.

I bet you that not many of us didn’t knew that the 70 runs Afridi scored against New Zealand was his first fifty after 33 Odi matches, but for  moment it seemed to me as if it is coming out of the mouth of a player who scores a 50 every fourth match, his statements after one rare batting performance are always full of reassurance and loaded with false hopes, but the funny thing is that we always buy it.

After years of pathetic performance with the bat Afridi scored two back to back match winning 50′s in the T20 WC after which he was immediately made the T20 captain. Younis Khan must be sitting on a prayer mat tonight thanking the Almighty that Afridi didn’t scored another 50 in the 2nd Odi against Newzealand because if he had done so, YK’s dream of leading Pakistan in WC2010 would have ended prematurely.

Afridi scored a first ball duck today going the ariel route the first ball he faced, which made me think what happened to the responsible Afridi? Was he on Vacation today? Will we see him again after 33 matches or sooner? Nothing predicts behaviour like behaviour if that is correct then his next match winning batting performance will come after a few series but rest assured you will continue to get false assurances in the mean time,