Maxwell joins Pringle

One of the matches that got me hooked on cricket was this one in Hobart in 1990, when Australia needed 2 runs to win going into the final over, and Chris Pringle bowled a maiden (assisted by a slightly dubious non-wide call early in the over).

Today, Glenn Maxwell has joined Pringle in the required last over maiden club by bowling Australia to victory in similar circumstances.

It was an incredible effort from Maxwell, but unfortunately, with the history of both Pakistan and of matches held in the Emirates, there is a sniff of suspicion about it.  I really hope that every player was making a genuine effort, as the result is a storybook one.

CricketGeek Player Profiles: Glenn Maxwell

Glenn Maxwell is an exciting young allrounder from Victoria. He is a very quick scoring batsman and a handy off-spin bowler.

His recent form has been very impressive. He had a reasonable BBL for the Renegades, played a couple of games for the Delhi Daredevils, but then really shone for Hampshire in the Friends Life t20 in England.

He had the 8th highest batting index in the competition, with an average of 44.75 and a strike rate of 175.49. To add to that he took 7 wickets at an average of 25.5 and an economy rate of 7.56.

He has proven to be particularly good at hitting boundaries, scoring roughly on boundary every 5 balls. He's also developed a reputation as a great fielder.

Here are a couple of graphs of how his career t20 averages have shaped up recently.

His batting averages are going up, and generally his bowling averages are going down. This is exactly what should be happening for a quality player in his breakthrough season.

But the ultimate proof of his rise is that the Australian selectors have opted for him ahead of Dave Hussey, the highest run scorer in t20 history. How he goes in that role will be interesting. The one thing that his opponents will probably be aware of is that he has tended to get out to off-spin early in his innings. That's not exactly a good weakness to have in Sri Lankan conditions, but it also might be something that the selectors feel is just an anomaly.