I struggled to sleep before India matches: Waqar

Just-retired Pakistani fast bowler Waqar Younis says he often found it difficult to sleep on the night before matches against India.

Just-retired Pakistani fast bowler Waqar Younis says he often found it difficult to sleep on the night before matches against India.

"I hardly played against India. (But) of course, it was a definite motivation for me," Younis told IANS.

Of his 87 Tests, in which he captured 373 wickets, Waqar played just four against India. Of his 262 one-day internationals, in which he accounted for 416 scalps, he played only 26 against India.

"At times, I was struggling to sleep (the night before matches against India) because of the pressure and all that.

"But when you are on the field, it was a different ball game altogether. I regret that I hardly got to play against India," Younis maintained.

The 32-year-old, however, said that all the Indians he played against were great mates off the field.

"They are all good friends. Off the field they are all good friends, but on the field I didn't like anybody," he said, in his typically forthright manner.

During his cricket career, Younis was also pulled up a couple of times for alleged ball tampering and fined and suspended by the International Cricket Council (ICC).

ICC match referee John Reid of New Zealand said Younis had privately admitted to ball tampering.

"He told me (at the end of a hearing in 2000) 'I have been doing it for 15 years,'" Reid had told IANS when he was in India in 2002 for a series against Zimbabwe.

That hearing was called after television cameras caught Younis and Pakistani all-rounder Azhar Mahmood scuffing the ball during a one-day international against South Africa at Colombo in 2000.

"I said: 'But we are here to catch you, and we have the technology to do it.' He was definitely interfering with the ball. He was taking leather off it," Reid, who has since been dropped from the match referees' panel, had said.

Questioned about this, Younis attempted to sidestep the issue.

"I don't know what you are talking about, and I don't know what he said," he responded. "I have no idea about it. Since I've retired from cricket, I don't want to get into it. Go and ask him what I said."

When told that the Reid had made his allegation on tape, Waqar retorted: "Then he is talking crap."

Waqar, who was known for his ability to reverse swing the ball, said he got hooked to fast bowling by watching speedsters like Tahir Naqqash and Azeem Hafiz.

"Sarfraz Nawaz was as such not a motivation for me or inspired me because I never saw him bowling," he said.

"I used to see Imran Khan bowl, as also Wasim Akram. I actually saw bowlers after Sarfraz, like Tahir Naqqash and Azeem Hafiz, but I mostly saw Imran and Wasim in my early days," he said.

"So that was a great inspiration for me because when I was playing first-class cricket it was something new for me," added Younis.