Mohammad Abbas

The Quaid-E-Azam Trophy, 2015-16 season, saw Mohammad Abbas topping the bowling charts by picking up 61 wickets in 10 games. And in the next season, he picked up 71 wickets to force the limelight to be switched on to him. So, from almost a curse of oblivion, now he was back into the reckoning.

This forced the national selectors to have a look at him and he was picked for the tour to Windies in 2017. Abbas shone immediately and nipped out Kraigg Brathwaite off his second ball in Test cricket. In his third Test against Windies at Roseau, the medium-pacer picked up a fifer. He ended up with 15 wickets from three Tests in the Caribbean.

The skiddy customer was also a part of the 2-match Test series against Sri Lanka but did not have much of an impact in a series which Pakistan lost in the UAE, their adopted home.

The journey started from a village in Sialkot and then to be rubbing shoulders with the best in Pakistan and outperforming them was a dream come true for someone like Abbas, who hails from a modest background.

Like many in Pakistan, his tryst with the game started off with tape-ball cricket and by the age of 16, he was playing club cricket in Sialkot city. Shahid Anwar, his under-19 coach pushed him harder to achieve his potential and he broke into the Sialkot first-class team in 2009. Since then he has played for Pakistan Television, Khan Research Laboratories and now Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited.

Inspired by Glenn Mcgrath and Mohammad Asif, Abbas can swing the ball both ways and in seaming conditions, is more than a handy bet. In order to acclimatize better for the tour to England in 2018, Abbas decided to play county cricket and was signed up by Leicestershire. This decision paid rich dividends as Abbas played a clinching role in Pakistan's victory over the hosts at Lord's, London, with him grabbing eight wickets.