Although in awe of Imran Khan &ndash for his force of personality &ndash his heroes are mostly English David Gower most of

Although in awe of Imran Khan – “for his force of personality” – his heroes are mostly English “David Gower most of all I loved watching him So elegant, so fluent And later Thorpe.”He was born in Rawalpindi, in June 1977 “But I was brought up in Lahore. Some observers have said that he reminds them of Saeed Anwar, but Afzaal, while by no means in denial of his Pakistani background, prefers to draw comparison with Englishmen. It was great being around some of my heroes, like Graham Thorpe.”Like Thorpe, Afzaal is a free-scoring left-handed batsman (he also bowls a bit, slow left-arm). Yeah, it was frustrating not playing Test cricket on the tour I’d rather be playing than not playing But I’d also rather be there than not be there. I showed what I can do, but now I want to say that it’s nothing compared with what I can really do. It is not, however, a question he asks himself.”The way I look at it, in my last Test match, against the best team in the world – the best team ever, they say – I took them on and scored 54 in 71 or 72 balls. Afzaal has more than proved himself at county level but the question is whether he can flourish in the crucible of Test cricket, that 54 notwithstanding.It is a question that clearly exercises the England management of David Graveney and Duncan Fletcher, who took him on tour to India and New Zealand but did not play him, and have not yet given him a central contract.

McGrath’s remark about big boys’ cricket, smart-arse or not, was evidently spot-on. I got 97 not out.”So, 150 against McGrath, and 97 not out against Warne, but in his first Test match, nothing much to trouble the scorers. His first ball was a slower ball, and I played it, and we looked at each other.”I got four or six, something like that, and then got bowled, out of the rough, by Shane Warne I’d faced him before, in a one-day game against Hampshire. But, as I passed him on my way out, he said “welcome to big boys’ cricket” or some smart-arse comment like that. My first ball was against [Glenn] McGrath, and I’d smacked him all round Trent Bridge in a county game I got 150 or so, and really took him to the cleaners. If my confidence scares people, it scares them.”I ask him what he recalls of his Edgbaston debut? “I wasn’t as nervous as I thought I would be. But I am a confident lad, and nobody is going to knock that out of me.

“It’s true that I arrived in my car, but I didn’t have the music at full blast, and I wasn’t using a mobile phone, as someone said I just came to play cricket I’m not stupid. And “yeeahh!” And “ohhhhh!” And “hahahaha!” He is a loud and lively character, too loud and lively even for the Australians, who complained last summer that Afzaal turned up at the Edgbaston Test with music blaring from his Saab convertible, in a manner unbefitting a professional cricketer about to make his Test debut.”A bundle of crap,” Afzaal says, of that particular charge. We now meet, on an April afternoon almost as warm as that eventful afternoon in south London, in the shadow of the pavilion at Lord’s, where Afzaal and his Nottinghamshire team-mates are preparing to play Middlesex in the County Championship.For 20 minutes or so I watch him and four others in slip-catching practice, under the steely eye of their coach, Clive Rice.The session is noisy but only Afzaal is making the noise “Catch it!” he cries. And with those two heartfelt gestures he acknowledged both sides of his heritage; his early childhood in Lahore and subsequent upbringing in the Pakistani community in Nottingham, and his nurturing, along with the likes of Andrew Flintoff, as an English cricketer of great promise.I was privileged to be at The Oval that day, watching admiringly from the Surridge stand. While the headline-writers worked out how best to accommodate the name Ramprakash – who that day scored his first Test century on English soil – and the correspondents in the press box leafed through their Wisdens for some statistics to enhance their paragraph on Shane Warne’s 400th Test wicket, Afzaal found it hard to keep a lid on his euphoria.
After pushing Jason Gillespie to point for the all-important single, he kissed the daveez – a strip of black cloth covering words from the Koran, given to him by his mother and tied around his right wrist He then kissed the three lions on the side of his helmet. Of the three notable performances which distinguished the gloriously sunny Saturday of The Oval Test match last summer, Usman Afzaal’s debut 50 was perhaps the least momentous.But not for him. In December, the Government refused to give the project the final go-ahead after last-minute doubts about the business plan..

The Wembley saga has centred on the spiralling cost of the scheme and whether to include other sports in the rebuilt stadium. He said: “It is a matter for the FA which institutions they approach.”WestLB, Barclays and the FA-owned Wembley National Stadium declined to comment. If the German banks can see a business opportunity then I’m sure any of the English banks could.”The German funding proposal is being put together by Robin Saunders, an American who is admired in the City for her skill in complex deals, including a £1.4bn bond restructuring deal for Formula One motor racing. He said: “It does seem a bit sad we can’t fund the whole thing. One of the winning team, George Cohen, described the proposal as bizarre. Germany is regarded by many English fans as their bitterest footballing rival and Wembley hosted the nation’s most famous victory, when England beat West Germany 4-2 in the 1966 World Cup final.