What Gayles Karachi!

The Jamaican superstar has been one of the biggest flops of PSL this season

DUBAI: When Karachi Kings drafted Chris Gayle as their top pick, they must have hoped that the Jamaican superstar will roar like a lion in the second edition of HBL Pakistan Super League, writes Khalid Hussain.

But so far the self-proclaimed ‘Universe Boss’ has been treated like a lamb by rival bowling attacks and Karachi has suffered because of their master blaster’s failure to live up to expectations.

On Thursday night, cricket fans witnessed perhaps the most unGayle-like innings from the West Indian big-hitter as Quetta Gladiators thrashed Karachi by six wickets at the Dubai International Stadium.

As Karachi looked to post a big total after put into bat by Quetta, Gayle walked in at number three with his team placed at 63-1 in 7.5 overs.

Gayle took his time to settle down but even after doing that he was unable to make his presence felt. In the end he was dismissed for 28 after a long, 34-ball stay on the crease during which he hit just two sixes and a four.

It was far from what Gayle had promised to Karachi fans in the lead up to the game.

“Sixes and fours, I’ll give you your sixes and fours Ok. If it doesn’t happen my bad,” Gayle told fans in a video post on Twitter.

“I’ll make sure that at the end of the day, the team (Karachi Kings) comes first, and this team is an entertainment team... and were try to make it special for you guys out here,” he said.

On Thursday night he failed to do so as Karachi slipped closer to an embarrassing first round exit.

Gayle had been a major disappointment in the event so far as before his 28, he had outings of 2,10,5,2,11 in five previous games.

However, Karachi captain Kumar Sangakkara refused to blame Gayle for his team’s loss against Quetta.

“He tried his best to hit the ball. I think it was just a case where he forgot to rotate the strike if he was not hitting it well,” said Sangakkara.

“It was a very disappointing performance today,
especially with the bat to start off with. We had a
great start again but could not capitalise. We left about 30 runs out there on the
field and that makes it hard,” he said.

“You have an entire bad performance once in a while, unfortunately we had three of them and hopefully we can come back with two out of two wins,” added the former Sri Lanka captain.

Karachi need to win their last two games to avoid the ignominy of not qualifying for the playoffs.