We love to covince ourselves with reasons on why Pakistan will go on to lift the trophy. Many have written on the same subject, and a couple of the reasons listed below might also be identical to the ones you have read earlier. There might be more (definitely), but these are the similarities between the 1992 campaign and the the one underwary right now. Some of these repeated themselves in our victory in the T20 World cup in 2009 as well, and back home when a particular series of events recur and give us what we want to see.. we stamp them as pre-requisites for times to come. Let's have a look and feel good till we can :

1) Intikhab Alam

Ask a newborn in Pakistan who do you want as the National cricket teams coach and he'l say Intikhab Alam. He wouldn't even know how Intikhab uncle looks like but he'l know that this was the same coach who was with us when we won the World cup in 1992 and even when we won the T20 World cup in 2009. Even though he isn't coach, his mere presence has charged the team up, or maybe it's just the effect of a rare sane person in the squad.

2) Aqib Javed

One more personality in the same category as above is the man who was spotted by Imran khan when he was 17 years old. He bowled in the 1992 World Cup with the intelligence that can be branded as gifted (who can forget his slower delivery which got Mark Greatbatch).
Give him extra points as he was the bowling coach in the T20 campaign in 2009 as well. Imran Khan always said he was more intelligent than Wasim and Waqar, it's time to show the world how true this is.

3) Led by a Khan

The only times we have won World Titles was when our leader had a Khan tag.
Imran Khan did it 1992
Younus Khan did it in 2009
and Shahid Khan will do it in 2011

4) Beating the unbeaten

New Zealand was an unbeaten side in the 1992 WC, the only side to beat them was Pakistan. The cornered tigers actually humbled them twice. The most memorable was the one that came in later in the Semi finals

South Africa romped over all their opponents in the 2009 T20 WC, until the men in green put the breaks on in a nail biting finish

Our men have already given an indication on what is to come by beating the unbeaten Aussies and putting to halt what has been an amazing winning streak of 34 games on the trott spanning 3 World cup tournaments.

5) Dethrone Australia

Whom did we dethrone when we won the cup in 1992 ?
Australia

Whom do we have dethrone when we do it again on the 2nd of April 2011 ?
Oops ! Australia again


The only two times we won the title, the captain quit (atleast that particular form of the game). Imran khan called it quits after 1992 and Younus khan announced his retirement from the T20 version. Only if Afridi can make a similar announcement, this should be the final nail in the coffin.

Here's to Pakistan's Third ICC World Title !

Pakistan won the ODI World Cup on this day. 25th March 1992.

Not many Pakistan cricket fans will forget that date.

Maybe if we as a country had more to be proud of or had we won the world cup 4 times like the Aussies, 25th March wouldn't hold much significance. But the fact that that is the only time that Pakistan won the world cup and that too of a sport that is close to religion and life for some, 25th March is significant. It is very significant.

That period of the early 90s was also a good overall period for sports in Pakistan. Apart from the cricket world cup, Pakistan won the hockey world cup in 1994, Jansher Khan was the number 1 ranked squash player at that time, and Mohammad Yousuf (not the artist formerly known as Yohanna) was the world snooker champion. Sadly such is no more the case.

Moving back to happy times.

I was all of 12 when the 1992 world cup took place, and I was just starting to get the grasp of the nitty gritties of cricket as a player and a watcher.

The '92 world cup collided with the boom of the sattellite dish in the Middle East and watchingm LIVE cricket on TV apart from the tournaments held in Sharjah, was a new phenomenon in the UAE.

The dish in our house was installed on the day Pakistan was to start its campaign against the Windies. By the time the decoder caught the signal, Rameez Raja was approaching his 100 and Pakistan's innings was coming to a close.

Pakistan lost that match and also those against India and South Africa. A miracle gave them 1 point in the washed out match against England in which they had been bowled out for a mere 73. After the first 5 games out of 8 in the group stage, Pakistan had only managed to beat Zimbabwe and they had all of 3 points.

With 3 matches to go, the competition seemed over for Pakistan and the newspapers were full of criticism and some journalists had even gone to the extent of reporting the details of the flight that the Pakistani cricketers would be returning on.

The build up to the world cup was hardly any good for Pakistan. Skipper Imran Khan had a shoulder injury, which prevented him from bowling. Their pace spearhead Waqar Younis had broken down with a stress fracture of the back and was ruled out of the world cup. Javed Miandad had been initially dropped from the squad due to indifferent form and Saleem Malik was named the official Vice Captain. Miandad only made it to the squad when Imran Khan informed the management that he won't be able to play in the initial matches.

The squad comprised of a number of inexperienced young cricketers with minimal international experience - Inzamam-ul-Haq, Aamir Sohail, Aaqib Javed, Mushtaq Ahmed were only a year old in international cricket.

Moreover, with Miandad captaining the side ahead of official Vice Captain Saleem Malik when Imran Khan sat out the first few matches, Malik led a mini revolt inside the dressing room disturbing the young inexperienced team.

Many books and documentaries on Pakistan's '92 world cup victory have done the rounds and I'm not sure if this story has been told before. I am sharing it cause it is my favorite and it will probably go down as the moment that turned the tide for Imran Khan's cornered tigers.

The night before the match against Australia, Imran Khan had summoned his troops at the team hotel. Pakistan had just arrived at Perth from Brisbane where they had lost their match to South Africa. The team dressed in their green coats and khaki trousers waited for the skipper and in some time Imran Khan turned up wearing a T-shirt with a tiger printed on its front.

It was then that he spoke to the team about his dream of winning the world cup. About how he wanted everyone to pick themselves up. About how Saleem Malik should think whether he wants to play for Pakistan ever again or not. About how the Pakistanis were cornered like tigers and they had to win all their matches from here and also hope that other results are in their favor for having any chance to make it to the semis. Imran Khan spoke to each member personally in that meeting. He even held a press conference after that requesting the Pakistani public that he believed his team can do it and they all should pray for them.

Pakistan beat Australia the next day. They had never beaten Australia at Perth before that and I doubt they did ever again, but if anyone gets the chance to watch that match again, do so to see what Pakistan can do on a day they believe in themselves.

They went on to beat Sri Lanka in the next game and New Zealand as well who had not lost a single game the whole tournament. Australia managed to beat West Indies in their final league match, which gave Pakistan a ticket to the semi finals. 1 extra point from a rained off game had pushed Pakistan through. It was truly a miracle.

The rest, as everyone says, is history.

Pakistan had won 5 matches on the trot, new heroes were born, Imran Khan's dream had come true, and the Pakistani tigers had won the cricket World Cup!

These memories will hardly ever go.

I am bad with dates and names. I am bad with statistics pertaining to the game as well. I can't recall when this affair with the game began for me - but I do remember watching Miandad score a century on the opening day of the world cup 1987 against Sri Lanka in Hyderabad. I do remember collecting coke bottle caps during the tournament to win the free scoring sheet that Coke had offered to its consumers. I do remember feigning stomachache and pulling a sicky from my class to watch the semi-final with Australia, tallying every run and wicket on the most prized-scorecard till Steve Waugh hit Jaffar for 18 in the last over. With the last over of Aussie innings not in my scorecard, I started afresh in Pakistan innings. Don't remember much, except that Bruce Reid clean-bowled Miandad and my scorecard remained incomplete, and down the throat of a dust-bin. I remember watching the Sharjah-6 by Miandad. I remember Imran Khan inviting Indian film-stars to raise donations. I remember Zia's crash, and I remember Nazia Zoheb's young tarang, where Ali Azmat sang Dosti with Jupiters (awesome song by a crap band).

But I think the affair became an obsession at the start of 92 world cup. Waqar was sidelined, and Miandad not selected. There was wholesale criticism about Imran, and everybody at my dad's press (where I used to spend my evenings getting acquainted to computers) proclaimed doom for Imran Khan. There is history here as well. Both Imran and Miandad had their exclusive fanbase ... and this was reflected by where a person was physically based in Pakistan. If you are in Karachi/Hyderabad, Miandad was the superman, and Imran was perceived to be this conniving dictator, who had this sectarian-based agenda of sidelining players from Sindh, and had a personal vendetta against Miandad on top of it. I was (still am) an idealist - and was extremely miffed by this sheer bias of my dad's folks as I could never understand how hatred for one person (Imran) and love for another (Miandad) would lead somebody to actually dismiss the entire Pakistani campaign even before it began. In one of those arguments with a bunch of over-patronising elders, I proclaimed "Imran will bring the cup to Pakistan."

Nobody took me seriously but myself. I would wake up in the middle of the night, make myself sehri, and watch the match. Good thing I was in the middle of schools, and was usually at home. I remember Ramiz taking ages to get a century in the opening match, and then Lara completely dominating Pakistan attack. I went through heartache after heartache in the initial stages of the campaign. Yet, every evening at Iftar at the press, I would stand by my captain, and more than anything, reassure myself that Pakistan would win - often under extreme pressure from the patronizers. There was too much going against Pakistan. Ijaz was our 5th bowlder. Inzy wasn't clicking and floated in the batting order. I hated Iqbad Sikander. Yet Imran, Miandad and Akram were digging in deep - and there was this immovable faith in Imran Khan.

Then came the crunch games, we shared a point with England, and our qualification was on the road. I remember praying for Aussies victory against Windies, and actually offering 2-Nafils when the semi-final berth was confirmed. The blind-faith in Imran was paying off. I was boasting off in my dad's office. It was as if I was giving all those patronizing sonofbitches a finger-salute. The semi-final gave us a star in Inzy. Miandad, Imran and Was were the support act. Moin's pull for a straight six was a classic. Aaqib's slower one to get rid of Greatbatch. The moments have been etched in my memory. Then there was the final, Wasim was the beauty, Imran the anchor, Miandad the shrewd, Mushy provided the guile, and Ramiz the finishing. The world cup was ours.

Imran had brought the cup home. I lined up on the street to welcome our all-conquering heroes. I even campaigned for Shaukat Khanum Hospital fundraiser at school. That was the beginning of my passion for the sport. Imran retired, and we've been see-sawing on the cricketing map since then. Some good, some bad and some downright ugly moments form the sports history post 1992 triumph. I sat down to list the best-11 for ODIs after 1992, and here is what I came up with:

1. Saeed Anwar


2. Aamir Sohail


3. Abdul Razak


4. Inzamam-ul-Haq


5. Mohd. Yousuf


6. Shahid Afridi


7. Moin Khan (WK)


8. Wasim Akram (C)


9. Waqar Younis


10. Saqlain Mushtaq


11. Shoaib Akhtar

It's been 15 years since that triumph, and only 3 players in the current setup find themselves in the best-11 post-92 triumph. This is an astoundingly worrying prospect as in these 15 years we have given ODI debuts to a total of 76 people. Asif and Younis are the only other players from the current team that can potentially challenge to displace somebody from this list - though highly unlikely as Asif is no Waqar and Younis is no Inzy. The future is yet unknown - the openers are a dilemma that doesn't seem to resolve despite Butt's resurgence (i still doubt his ability), Misbah is a finisher who never finishes, and Rao/Tanvir are average bowlers at best. And we are still missing Razzak's batting in late order.

I am waiting for the nextgen of Ws and Inzy to come through. And yes, I still believe in Imran Khan. I am waiting for my captain to lead us out of the rot, this time the task is even bigger - it's the country. Yet the faith has never been stronger - both in the captain, and in the ability of the country to produce the next best thing to hit the cricketing world.