Sahibzada Mohammad Shahid Khan Afridi or in short Shahid Afridi is a Pakistani cricket player who is known for his explosive batting and his leg break bowling.
He is the current Captain of the Pakistani cricket team in the One Day and Twenty20 format. Shahid Afridi is known as Boom Boom Afridi and whenever he plays a match, the ground is filled with banners and hording which say Boom Boom Afridi.
Afridi had what we can say a dream start to a career. He was selected to play for the Pakistani cricket team at a very early age and his debut innings made him a legend in the cricket fraternity. Selected as a spinner for his side, he ended up scoring the fastest One Day International century, a record that he still holds under his belt.
Shahid Afridi or Boom Boom was born on 1 March 1980 and is a Pathan. He played his debut match on 2 October 1996 in Nairobi against Sri Lanka. At that time, he was unknown figure in Pakistan and in International circuit. The world was still praising Sanath Jayasuriya for his performances in the 1996 World Cup and no one knew that a rival is about to emerge in world cricket. As a change in strategy, he was promoted up the order and he produced one of the most destroying innings ever played by a batsmen. He scored a century from just 37 balls and it is still a record for the fastest century in ODI history.
Afridi is a very dangerous spinner as well. He has a huge variety in his bowling. He can bowl googly, a doosra and his flipper is one of his most lethal deliveries. He has so far bagged 288 ODI wickets. His best bowling performance is 6 for 38 against Australia. He is still one of the very best fielders in the Pakistani side and only the third player in world cricket to accomplish over 6000 runs, 250 wickets and 100 catches. He is also the most inconsistent batsmen in the world career due to his aggressive nature of batting and the only batsmen to score more than 6000 runs with an average of less than 25.
In his Test career, he showed a lot of promise but decided a few years ago to retire from the longest format to focus more on the shorter format of the game. Afridi scored 1,716 runs in his Test career at an average of 35.60. He also took 48 wickets in his Test career. He rates his performance in the home series against India in 2006 as his best in a Test series and his innings of 156 runs as his best ever.
Shahid Afridi has proven his worth in Twenty20 format of the game as well. His batting style and his bowling has made him a very dangerous player. He won the player of the tournament in the inaugural Twenty20 World Cup and played a leading role in the 2009 Twenty20 World Cup when he helped his side to raise the cup. He has scored 630 runs and collected 48 wickets in this format of the game.
