The Pakistani cricketer’s qualities are best revealed in the Twenty20 format, says Imran Yusuf.

Thirteen wins, three losses and a tie. It’s because of this overall record in 20/20 internationals that Pakistan, despite the anarchic violence, noisy struggles and doubts over its continuation (and that’s just me describing a Shoaib Akhtar run-up), is one of the favourites for next month’s 20/20 World Cup.

It is said that we’re so good in the shortest form of the game because it suits our temperament as a people. We lack discipline and concentration. We prize the quick fix solution over long-term strategy. We settle for easy, short-term gains over hard-earned, lasting achievements.

But we should also consider how our qualities are revealed in this format. I speak especially of the Pakistani inclination to take wickets. Ever since Fazal Mahmood took 12-99 at the Oval in 1954, we’ve been primarily a bowling team, relying on knocking over opponents with the ball in our hands, not beating them down with a bat.

Indeed, when one-day cricket was first introduced, it was thought that Pakistan would struggle. We were an attacking bowling team, geared to winning test matches with fiery spells, not grinding out victories with precise, orchestrated match-plans. 50 over cricket is a batsman’s game, and increasingly so. It has not been much fun to be an ODI bowler in the past ten years.

Since 1999, we have been on the decline in the 50 over game and other teams have surpassed us by relying on batting strength and making the most of flat pitches.

But the 20/20 format has surprised the cricket world because bowlers, once again, matter. Our victory against Australia came on the back of some devlish spin and penetrative fast bowling: weapons typically in the arsenal of successful test teams, obliged as they are to take twenty opposition wickets to win a match.

20/20 has returned cricket to its fun-loving origins. If one can look beyond the leotarded dancers (if one wants to), one sees in 20/20 cricket, and the way Pakistan has played it thus far, chance, surprise, spontaneity and magic - all these things so lacking in the standardised world we are creating. (Test cricket also has these in abundance, though Pakistan's impoverished cricket structure has meant we have not been as successful in the longer form of the game.) Is this not why we go to cricket? It is certainly not for line-length bowling and nudge-nudge batting. We have plenty of that sort of gradual accumulation in the rest of our lives.

What we want is what we saw in Thursday’s 20/20. The spirit soared at the predatory penetrations of Gul and the trickery of Afridi, Ajmal and Malik, with their doosras and quicker ones and arm balls and flippers. (One hopes the trickery was within the laws of the game: Ajmal has been reported for an illegal action. If it’s found that he bends his arm over the permitted fifteen degrees, he will miss the World Cup.)

Short bursts of madness and flair is the forte of Pakistani cricketers and while this tendency proves to be the cause of their downfall in the longer versions of the game, in Twenty20 cricket it is their biggest asset. Which leaves me, as a Pakistani supporter, to welcome the decline of 50 over cricket, and look forward to the 20/20 World Cup next month.