When the masters of playing spin are at their peak, the thoughts that dominate the higher functions of the mind are not necessarily about the next ball, the pitch, how fast it is turning, how much flight is being given, and how fast or slow it comes, but where the fielders are, how they manipulate them and by extension the opposition captain.
Here's Shivnarine Chanderpaul, a very good player of spin, talking about Brian Lara, who was arguably the best spin player ever (no one dominated Shane Warne and Muttiah Muralidaran, quite like Lara):
"I know Brian, when he bats, he hits the ball behind point, very hard. Sometimes he got spin on the ball, and sometimes he doesn't put spin on the ball. And he does it deliberately. It depends on where the guy on the point boundary is fielding. If the guy on the boundary is out square, then he puts spin on the ball so it keep running away further behind and the guy can't catch it. And sometimes they put him behind, and Brian hit it with no spin so it go in front for four. He still cuts the ball, but he does not put spin on the ball. He's an amazing batter. Serious."
Babar Azam had been an amazing batter - serious - too. Until the end of 2021, Babar averaged 89.94 against spin in ODIs with a strike rate of 89. These are, from a bowling team's perspective, "get him off strike and try and bowl as many as you can at the other guy" numbers. Babar was weaker against pace bowling, by which I mean he averaged only 57.22 against seam bowling.
But spin? Uff. He's never swept his way to hundreds, as others often do on Asian surfaces. But there were jaunts down the crease to clip balls through wide long-on, sinkings deep into the crease to play that whip shot through midwicket, cuts either side of point, and the regular array of Babar cover drives. When he slog-swept, the ball tended to travel over wide long-on, rather than square leg. No one much cared at the time, where it was going. Because it was going somewhere pretty often.
That a wall has been hit and a decline has been entered since then is public knowledge by now. The Babar of February 2025, has demons to overcome. Oppositions know this well. New Zealand, the kings of finding little gaps in the armour of opposition and wriggling through them to the semi-finals of major tournaments, landed on a big one in the tournament opener. Babar, by his high standards, doesn't love the ball that turns into him. Since 2022, he's loved it even less.
Until the end of 2021, he'd averaged 51.72 against balls that turned in (offspinners and left-arm wristspinners combined). From 2022 onwards, he's averaged 31.80 against balls turning in. The killer stat is the strike rate - where before the end of 2021 it had been 88.49 against bowlers whose stock delivery turned the ball into him, since then it has dipped to 67.65.
And where Babar was once a batter who would dictate fields to bowling teams, sides such as New Zealand, who play the percentages beautifully, have begun to dictate terms to him. In the Champions Trophy opener, Babar scored 22 off 35 balls off bowlers whose stock delivery came in. These were not offpsinners of the highest quality. With apologies to the index finger of Michael Bracewell, the man is clearly a better batter. For Glenn Phillips, offspin is clearly his third-best cricketing discipline, to follow his spectacular fielding and manic batting.
That the two were so adept at keeping Babar quiet is down to their field placements too. For much of that innings, there was a short midwicket in place, which would have made Babar think twice about that whip to the legside that is a favoured middle-overs shot. A more confident Babar would have hit over the top, smoked boundaries either side of that fielder, and wormed his way in the brain of the opposing captain. He made 64 off 90, when to be up with the required rate he would have had to make better than a run-a-ball. It was, if we are being brutally honest, a match-losing innings.
In ODIs at least, the batting against spin has been Babar's primary problem. In fact, his batting against pace has improved - he averages 57.52 against pace since 2022, when he'd averaged 47.35, both strike rates hovering around the 90 mark. Oppositions know this now. Babar opened the innings Wednesday, but he faced 57 balls of spin, to the 33 deliveries of seam bowling.
India have such a surfeit of spin options, that they will almost inevitably seek to expose this frailty. They have Kuldeep Yadav as one bowler who can turn the ball into Babar. In the squad, also is Washington Sundar.
Spinners turning the ball into a great right-hand batter tend to fare poorly, generally speaking. But we are not in a great phase of Babar's batting right now. India will also come armed with the knowledge that this particular great player of spin is scratching his way to fifties, rather than dictating fields to oppositions. And in Dubai, they will likely play on a track that will envenom the kinds of bowlers Babar does not love facing right now.