Cool like Shahid
Pakistan's captain is so great, this list of things that illustrate his greatness is probably redundant
Imran Yusuf
06-May-2010
The defending World Twenty20 champions aren't looking too hot at this year's tournament. Pakistan need some spark, some gumption, and if history is to go by, it will have to come from a captain fantastic. So in an effort to reinvigorate the main man and galvanise the team, I want to remind Shahid Afridi (and the rest of the world) that nobody, and I mean nobody, messes with the floppy-haired beast - not even the mighty Chuck Norris himself.
1. The ball-biting incident was Shahid Afridi having an early-evening snack. At actual meal-times, Shahid Afridi eats meteorites.
2. Shahid Afridi doesn't bowl googlies because he thinks the name is too sissy.
3. Shahid Afridi is so blindingly brilliant that batsmen request the sightscreen be moved in front of wherever he's fielding.
4. Shahid Afridi doesn't wear a crotch guard because he's made of steel down there. A fast bowler once struck him in the "sensitive area". The ball went ping and soared out of the ground for six.
5. Most cricketers sledge. Shahid Afridi delivers the last rites.
6. No batsman has ever walked to a Shahid Afridi lbw appeal, because on impact their legs are immediately broken.
7. Shahid's Afridi's flipper is so quick and slippery because he actually springs a real live dolphin out of the back of his hand.
8. Shahid Afridi's beard is so virile it makes Chuck Norris' face seem like a freshly powdered baby's bottom.
9. One season Shahid Afridi had a batting strike rate of infinity.
10. One season Shahid Afridi had a bowling strike rate in the negative numbers.
11. Shahid Afridi's legbreaks are so sharp, Gillette will bring them out next year as the Mach 4.
12. Shahid Afridi once made the home fans at an opposition team's stadium cry so much that "rain" stopped play.
13. Shahid Afridi has broken so many hearts they had to set up a special cardiovascular institute in Karachi.
14. The Bangladeshi batting line-up are so short because years ago Shahid Afridi chopped their ancestors in half with a single roundhouse pull shot, shortening the gene pool forever.
15. The Australian bowling line-up are so tall because years ago Shahid Afridi stormed their ancestors' village in a cricket pitch roller and stretched everything in sight, elongating the gene pool forever.
16. Shahid Afridi is called Boom Boom because he's actually Pakistan's top-secret most powerful nuclear bomb.
17. Shahid Afridi has such great hair that L'Oreal came weeping at his feet in shame, crying, "We're not worth it."
18. Shahid Afridi is so strong he needs only needs 20 items in this list. Other so-called tough guys are so insecure and over-hyped they need over 200 websites devoted to bigging themselves up.
19. Shahid Afridi is still only 30 years old because when he looked at Time three years ago, it got so scared it froze.
20. Oh, and one more thing: Shahid Afridi scored the fastest century in international cricket in his first-ever innings in international
cricket.
Imran Yusuf works for the Express Tribune, an English-language newspaper in Pakistan. The things in this article aren't actually, like, true, except for one