Mohammad Amir's late swing was hard to negotiate: Marcus Trescothick

Former England opener Marcus Trescothick had seen it all when he faced Mohammad Amir in the warm-up match between the touring Pakistan side and Somerset. Amir claimed 3 wickets for 36 runs in his 11 overs.

Trescothick started off with two boundaries off his first over. But the left-arm pacer struck with his 14th delivery on his first-class cricket comeback on English soil. Trescothick was also not in a good position to handle the outswinger from Amir as he had his front leg open towards the on-side and was squared as the ball took the outside edge to be grabbed by the keeper.

“He bowled very well,” said Trescothick, “He swung the ball really late, that’s the biggest thing we noticed. In my ‘magnificent’ eight, I thought it was pretty hard work, it was tricky.”

“You get a lot of bowlers who swing it quite early but he was swinging it late and as it was coming down the pitch, you were almost guessing whether it was an inswinger or whether it was one of the straight ones,” he explained.

Also check out – CricToon: Mohammad Amir has an immediate impact after landing in England

Out of his 3 wickets in the day, Amir also had an in-swinger cleaned up a right-handed batsman from around the wicket. “He got Adam Hose with a good inswinger round the wicket and Pete Trego got an absolute beauty.”

Amir, who is returning from a ban after the 2010 spot-fixing scandal is surely a worry for the English men. Trescothick added: “That bit of extra pace is the thing. He hasn’t played international cricket for a number of years, so there’s probably an extra bit of zip he has that makes him hard work.”

“I don’t think you’d expect anything else,” said Trescothick. “We get on and play the game and it is what it is.”

Pakistan opener Shan Masood said, “He hasn’t lost it. If anything, he’s just got better.” England recently defeated Sri Lanka 2-0 in the Test series, but Pakistan is expected to give the Alastair Cook-led side a tough time in the series. “We have to respect England, how good they are … but we’re up for it,” insisted Masood. “We’re ready to come to England and give them a good match.”

Also read – Amir served his time and is absolutely right to come back: Alastair Cook