Genital short

You have to wonder how and why the state of Shoaib Akhtar’s lunchbox has become quite so publicly known; these things must’ve come up and been hidden before in a game in which players spend so much time away from home. Thinking of the tabloid traps that Botham fell into on tour in the 80s, you could easily conclude that we all misinterpreted a ‘groin injury’ of his; the whole TMS ‘legover’ incident was so funny was because it was Botham, it wouldn’t have worked if it were David Sheppard. Well it would, but for very different reasons.

Slightly odder is that it was the Pakistani Cricket Board which brought this information into the public realm; openly mocking one of their star players (unless such things are seen as run-of-the-mill as a chipped fingernail in Pakistan).

Now it’s true that Shoaib hasn’t been the easiest chap to manage over the years: the briefest research reveals a plethora of allegations; failed drug tests, chucking bans, attitude problems, ball tampering, jet-skiing whilst supposedly injured, throwing a bottle into the crowd, being sued by and counter-suing the PCB during the spat over his ban due to repeated disciplinary breaches last year.

This is just the latest in a long line of problems, now his “sexually active” lifestyle (as a drugs tribunal put it in 2006) appears to have caught up with him. There’s one thing I know after this: you wouldn’t see me taking the board to court.