UMER GUL (PAKISTAN)

Introduction:

Umar Gul  (born 14 April 1984) is a Pakistani right arm fast medium bowler in cricket who has played Test matches,One Day Internationals and T20 Internationals for the Pakistani cricket team. He has gained fame as one of the most successful bowlers in T20 cricket finishing as the leading wicket taker and bowler in both the 2007 and 2009 T20 World Championshiptournaments. Umar Gul is the second most highest wicket taker(74) in T20 International cricket,only behind Saeed Ajmal. He won the T20 International Performance of the Year 2013.

Career:

Gul was first called up for the team in April 2003, playing four one-day matches at the Cherry Blossom Sharjah Cup against Zimbabwe, Kenya and                  Sri Lanka, where he took four wickets, and he was in and out of the one-day team after that tournament. However, he played the whole of the 2003–04 home series against Bangladesh, making his Test debut and taking 15 wickets in the three Tests, and took the second-most wickets of any Pakistani bowler in the series, behind Shabbir Ahmed with 17. 

Gul was retained for the ODIs against Bangladesh, taking a List A best five for 17 in nine overs in the third match, and ended with 11 wickets in the 5–0 series win. However, he could still not command a regular spot, playing three of Pakistan's nine next ODIs before finally getting dropped after one for 36 against New Zealand.

He was recalled and played two Tests after that taking four wickets in a drawn Test against New Zealand before coming in as replacement for Shabbir Ahmed in the second Test of the three-Test series against India. He took 16 wickets in 3 tests, including notable spells of reverse swing bowling. He was responsible for breaking Ramnaresh Sarwan's toe with a dipping yorker.

In the 2009 ICC World T20, he performed well, earning the mantle from at least one pundit of "the outstanding seam bowler of the World T20". His five-wicket haul for just six runs, when Pakistan defeated New Zealand, won especial acclaim. The spell made him the first bowler in history to take a five wickets in a T20 international, and he held the record of best T20 bowling figure until 8 August 2011, when surpassed by Ajantha Mendis (6/16). Mutterings were made about a possible correlation between ball tampering and the exorbitant amounts of reverse-swing he was able to extract, but he denied them categorically: "whenever an Asian bowler performs and uses the reverse-swing, the Western cricketing countries raise the issue of ball-tampering against them.

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