'I think we will beat India or Australia'
In the second part of the interview, Pakistan's captain talks about the side's prospects in the Champions Trophy, the legacy he wants to leave behind, winning the World Twenty20, and cricket's formats
I always speak to these youngsters and try to draw them a picture. I say, "Do everything you want, but make a career for yourself first." I didn't do anything, if you take out the first seven-eight years, I remember, in 2005-06 if a girl called my hotel room, I would answer and say I wasn't there, pretending to be someone else. My focus was always on making my career. Where I've come from only I know how difficult it has been. God has given me an opportunity to make something of myself and I cannot waste that. Whether he is Fawad Alam, Mohammad Aamer or Umar Akmal, he has to first see where he has come from, what his parents, his family are, and if he does stray, what impact it will have on them. I always paint this picture. One tournament or series is nothing. Unless you have 4000-5000 runs or 150-odd wickets, you have done nothing.
You know, even now when I go around meeting people, they congratulate me and that sort of drives it home a little, how much it meant. During the whole tournament we were constantly talking about how much we needed to win that tournament, how good it would be for Pakistan if we won it. We didn't know it, I guess, but in a way we were motivating ourselves - that Pakistan is in a bad way and we needed to do something. I kept saying it to the press that we, of all countries, needed to win it the most. I found out later, given the situation in parts of the country while we were there, just how amazing the whole thing was. It carries a lot of worth for us, a lot of worth, to know that people were so happy about it.
After we beat Holland, and the manner in which we beat them, I got an inkling that something could be done. Before the New Zealand win, I could sense that we were building up some momentum and it would be difficult to stop it. We won the toss in a couple of games, which helped, like against South Africa, and we knew if we scored 150 we could defend it. In the final we won and we batted second. Nasser Hussain even asked about the decision, and I said, "It is because we felt like it." And it worked.
I can feel something, I just have this feeling that we might beat one of India or Australia. I feel, it is my own feeling only, that we can change some history here. The way we have prepared for it, the way we worked in Lahore and here now, I feel positive. People are coming to us, like Shafqat Rana, and being surprised at how much we are working, how much we are training.
"Against Australia, if you need 25 off 10 balls, with eight wickets down, if Younis Khan can somehow play 10 out of those 10 balls with the tail, then maybe the 25 can be chased. This is the kind of pressure you need to handle"
We have already changed cricket so much, with Twenty20, super sixes in ODI tournaments, Powerplays in ODIs. If we make so many changes then will it stay the same game? It's very easy now in a sense. You can decide and pick whether you want to play ODI, Test or Twenty20 cricket. You can get satisfaction from each format, so why the need to change so much?
In this sense, when I see youngsters today, whoever is preparing, they don't ever say, "I am about to go and run five laps of the ground, or go for half an hour to the gym." They say, "We only have to play a three-hour Twenty20 match; we only have to hit shots in that." Every youngster is thinking this right now: it's only a three-hour match, so you don't need to train so much. You just need to hit the ball hard, win a match and take winnings. This is like life - everyone is going for the shortcut. But the shortcut will not always work in life; sometimes you need to work hard for things.
"If you want to play only fun cricket, play Twenty20. You can't get married and have six girlfriends as well, because you will get stuck somewhere"
Coaches are mostly good for youngsters. In the senior team there should be helpers who are also coaches, like Bob Woolmer was. He was a coach but he helped out with everything - in bowling, in life, in stretching, in luggage, in everything. This is not football, where you need to have that kind of coach. Here in cricket it is in individual game in a team game. When bowler bowls to batsman, this is an individual contest, and what will the coach do there? Coaches should be like Bob, who listened to everyone and counselled everyone, with 16 guys around who were all giving their own opinion.
It depends on fitness only. I don't want to hang around when my reflexes are gone and people are trying to kick me out. I just want that they let me know that this is our plan and you don't fit into it, so that I can leave with some dignity. I don't want to be kicked out. This depends on my fitness. I will be 34 in a month or so. After that, god willing, if I am fit and the performance is there, I can keep playing. I don't have to leave at 36 or 37, I might play on till 40 if I am doing well. Maybe even 50, if I am fit and performing. It will depend also on what the team's planning and thinking is, of course.
I reckon I could get into management - player management or something - after the game. My future lies somewhere within it.
I want, when I leave, people to remember me as an honest guy who left something behind, not someone who took something away with him. Many guys take many things away with them when they leave. Since I've become captain, Saeed Ajmal has stood up, Mohammad Aamer has stood up, Umar Akmal is about to stand up. I want to make Shoaib Malik stand up as he is still a young player. I want Kamran Akmal to stand up. Both are very good players already, but I want them to become the top players of their times. Like Imran [Khan] left the team in 1992, with Ijaz, Salim Malik, the two Ws - that team between 1992 and 1999 World Cup final dominated. Okay they lost some games but they won 60% of their games. My wish, when I leave, is that these guys stand up and become greats, that I am bid farewell lovingly and with dignity and that people remember that when I left, I left behind some bowlers, some batsmen, and a team that can stand for itself - like Steve Waugh did, or Imran Khan did. This guy, after 20 years, did something for us.
Osman Samiuddin is Pakistan editor of Cricinfo