Holding believes Ajmal has an upper hand over Swann

ISLAMABAD: Former West Indian fast bowler, Michael Holding has said that Saeed Ajmal has a better chance of making an impression in the series between Pakistan and England as compared to his English counterpart, Graeme Swann.

Pakistan and England will take on each other next month at the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the cricket pundits are predicting that it is going to be a battle between the spinners of both the teams.

The Green Shirts have the services of two quality spinners in shape of Saeed Ajmal and Abdur Rehman, whereas, England has recalled the left-arm spinner, Monty Panesar to support Swann.

Ajmal became the number one ranked ODI bowler in the ICC Rankings after the series against Sri Lanka.

While speaking to Pakpassion.com, Holding expressed that Ajmal is going to have a huge advantage over Swann because the later does not have this ball in his armoury. However, the former great is of the opinion that Swann is also going to enjoy the conditions in UAE, which are bound to assist the slow bowlers.

Holding said, "That's going to be really interesting because Saeed Ajmal has a delivery that Swann doesn't really bowl, which is the doosra. So that will be an extra dimension to Saeed Ajmal's bowling and of course, he will be bowling under conditions which he is familiar with. Graeme Swann, I think, will enjoy the conditions as well."

Since the ban imposed in M Aamir and M Asif, Pakistan's bowling attack has been under the scanner but the Green Shirts have still done well in the absence of their two premier bowlers.

Holding further added that England's bowling attack on the whole is better than that of Pakistans and this is going to release the pressure from Swann's shoulders.

"Swann has greater support bowlers, so Swann will have a better tangent to bowl within, in that he will have a better bowler at the other end to put pressure on the batsmen", the off-spinner added.

Copyright APP (Associated Press of Pakistan), 2011