Dubai: Saqib Ali, the former UAE captain and prolific run getter in domestic cricket, has been picked by Gemini Arabians to add to their reputation as the team with UAE flavour in the Masters Champions League (MCL) commencing next month.
For Ali, the chance to play in the Gemini Arabians team will be a trip down memory lane as he will get to play with legendary Pakistan spinner Saqlain Mushtaq.
Speaking to Gulf News, Saqib said: “It’s a great honour as a local cricketer to be picked to play alongside world class players of this team, especially Saqlain with whom I had played for the Pakistan junior team during the 1995-96 tour of New Zealand. In 1997 I came to the UAE to take up a job and missed playing with players like Saqlain and Rana Naveed Ul Hassan with whom I grew up playing cricket (with) in Pakistan. This is a great opportunity to again play with them despite me retiring from international cricket. To play with greats like Virender Sehwag, Kumar Sangakkara and Muttiah Muralitharan is a dream.”
Nalin Khaitan the team owner of the Gemini Arabians, who still plays in UAE’s domestic cricket and has seen many of Saqib’s great knocks, said: “We are extremely thrilled to have Saqib with us. Being a former UAE captain and one of the UAE’s most experienced cricketers he knows the wickets here very well and he will prove to be extremely valuable. He is a very consistent and prolific run getter in the domestic circuit and we are confident he will carry this into MCL and do well for Gemini Arabians.”
Though Saqib retired from international cricket in August this year, he continues to play for New Medical Centre (NMC). “Even last week I hit 63 runs in the Al Ain tournament. Moreover, I am now with the UAE national team as a batting consultant and I am regularly training players at the ICC Cricket Academy,” revealed Saqib, whose huge scores in International Cricket Council tournaments won him a place in the Combined Associate and Affiliate cricket team that played against the England Test team in 2011.
Saqib often played fighting knocks for the UAE, including his 101 runs in 103 balls in the Asian Cricket Council Trophy final against Nepal that ended in a nail-biting tie. In 2007, he played a brilliant captain’s knock against Bermuda in the ICC Intercontinental Cup. After scoring a duck in the first innings, he cracked 142 in the second innings to ensure his team a victory. He also once held the UAE innings together in the same tournament in 2007 against the formidable Ireland through a knock of 195 in the team’s total of 306. UAE lost the match by nine wickets but Saqib delayed the defeat by staying at the wicket for 456 minutes, playing out 356 balls and hitting 26 boundaries and four sixes.
In 2012, he bagged Dubai Cricket Council’s player of the tournament in the Blenheim Champions trophy with 395 runs and two centuries. In 2013, he bagged the Shyam Bhatia award for outstanding players of the year.
However, luck did not favour him. He missed playing in the 2014 ICC Twenty20 World Cup with an index finger fracture sustained during practice and was dropped from the ICC 2015 World Cup despite being in the squad till five days before the team’s departure. “It was my dream to play in the World Cup but sometimes you cannot get everything you want. I am now happy that Nalin has picked me to play with the world’s greatest cricketers and I will give my best,” he said.
