Zulfiqar Babar

Zulfiqar Babar is the classic example of a talented player taking a long time to get his dues and breaking into the international scene. Son of Pakistani footballer Abdul Ghaffar, Babar was born in a small town near Lahore called Okara. For Someone who relies on control than variation, Babar carved a niche for himself to make it through the ranks and represent Pakistan at the highest level in every format.

Babar made his first-class debut in the 2001-2002 season for Rest of Punjab and went on to play for Pakistan A in the next few years. A staggering effort in the 2009-10 Quaid-e-Azam tournament, in which he obtained 69 wickets at 16.42 helped him garner eye-balls of the national selectors. He bettered that by picking up 93 scalps in just 13 games in the 2012/2013 season at an impressive average of 17.04. If that was not enough, in a practice game between Pakistan Chief Ministers XI and Pakistan Cricket Board Chairman's XI in October 2013, Babar registered figures of 6-22, effectively forcing the selectors to pick him.

His got his due and finally debuted for the T20 side in July 2013 against West Indies, followed by a Test debut in October 2013 against South Africa, becoming one of the oldest Pakistanis' to do so. In his first T20 game itself, Babar took three wickets and also scored 13 off 17 balls to help his team to a narrow victory. He was the highest wicket-taker in the series and won the Man of the Series award for his brilliant performance. He was impressive even in his Test debut picking up 5 wickets in the match.

Zulfiqar was then selected for the 2014 World T20 in Bangladesh which was sadly the end of the road in ODIs. Even in ODIs, the selectors only gave him a few chances before moving to younger players. In Tests though, he was a nice foil to Yasir Shah till Mohammad Nawaz and others were given a chance in late 2016. Babar has played 15 Tests and it looks highly unlikely that he will play more.