Quote Originally Posted by Hilts View Post
Bashir at 21 has taken 66 Test wickets. 4 five fors. In 18 Tests and at 21 despite playing less Tests than Robert Croft did in his entire career he has taken more wickets and more 5 fors than Croft did.

(Im not saying Bashir is better than Croft because he isnt)

While id have been trying to persuade Rashid to play red ball cricket for years and I agree he is lucky to be playing I dont think Bashir deserves to be completely written off.
To be fair to Robert Croft's generation, I think players were a lot less willing to throw the towel in back in the 80s and 90s. It's strange, the standard of late order batting is far better nowadays, yet sides (it's not jiust England) fight a lot less hard to try and save games compared to their elders.

Based on the little I saw of him playing for Glamorgan, Bashir's a better bowler in test cricket than he is in the county game. He also benefits from this group of selectors' obsession with picking tall bowlers. Liam Dawson, who played against Glamorgan last night, is a far better bowler than Bashir in my opinion, (there's co comparison. between the two when it comes to batting as well), bnt he's about six inches too small for England's liking.