Battle-hardened Afridi the lynchpin---(Saad Shafqat)

Pakistan are coming to the World Cup on a turbulent trajectory. One of the original hosts, they were stripped of those rights following the terror attack in Lahore last year. In addition, the team has been hobbling from a series of mishaps, the latest and potentially most damaging of which is the spot-fixing scandal that has resulted in lengthy bans against three vital players. This turmoil makes the opening clash against Kenya an almost ideal start for them, offering a chance to settle jitters against an unrated opponent.

Fortunately for Pakistan, their cricket has gathered some momentum through the current season: two drawn Tests and a narrowly conceded five-match ODI series against South Africa, followed by decisive Test and ODI series wins in New Zealand that represent Pakistan's first serious overseas accomplishment in half a decade.

They are a team in transition, with seasoned veterans such as Younis Khan, Misbah-ul-Haq, and Abdul Razzaq, as well as bright young talent - players like Umar Akmal and Asad Shafiq. In Shahid Afridi they have an experienced and battle-hardened leader. Nevertheless, a brittle batting line-up and inconsistent fielding - Pakistan's traditional weaknesses - continue to plague the team. The opening pair hasn't been settled in years, and we can expect to see rotation in those slots, especially if there is an early loss or two.

Bowling is usually Pakistan's strongest asset, but they are missing two world-class seamers, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif, who have been sidelined by the spot-fixing mess. Umar Gul will spearhead the attack and should have capable back-up in the form of newcomer Wahab Riaz, although the third seamer's role expected to be variably served by Razzaq, Shoaib Akhtar or the unknown Junaid Khan is a potential weak link that will have to be offset by the trusted legspin-offspin combination of Afridi and Saeed Ajmal.

World Cup pedigree
Pakistan's previous World Cup finishes include three semi-finals, a final and a title, but those are distant memories. Their last two appearances were both preliminary-round exits, and the 2007 outing, especially, was a nightmare, when Ireland beat them and their coach, Bob Woolmer, was found dead the next morning. Even the 1999 World Cup, when they did very well and made the final, is a bitter memory because of the way the team eventually capitulated to Australia. And 1996, too, left an acrid taste after a quarter-final loss to arch-rivals India. You really have to go back to 1992 to find a World Cup tournament that resonates with Pakistani fans.

Recent form
For most of 2010, Pakistan had a dismal win-loss ratio placing them at the bottom of the international pile, worse even than Zimbabwe. They began the year with a 0-5 drubbing at the hands of Australia, followed by two key defeats (to India and Sri Lanka) in the Asia Cup in June. Later in the year, however, they picked themselves up. Although two subsequent encounters (against England and South Africa) were lost, Pakistan were able to push each series to a fifth-game decider, before finally notching a 3-2 series win in New Zealand. Their win-loss ratio over the last 12 months now places them sixth, ahead of West Indies, New Zealand, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.

Expert eye
Javed Miandad: Pakistan are a talented team fully capable of pulling off a surprise. In the 2011 format, a team only has to edge past the bottom three in its group and they are in the quarter-final, from where it is just three straight wins to the title. Any of the eight frontline teams can win this one.

Where they're likely to finish
Given Pakistan's well-earned reputation for volatility, they are an interesting bet for this tournament. It goes in their favour that the World Cup often goes to a team who start out as dark horses. On paper you would expect them to get past the group stage but succumb in the quarters to lack of confidence and the wild card of controversy. But Pakistan have a history of firing best when cornered, so anything can happen. Only a fool would rule them out.

Watchability
The brand of cricket played by Pakistan is nothing if not exciting. Their onslaughts can be murderous and their rearguards stirring. Even their collapses and surrenders are spectacular. This is a team that offers the cricket enthusiast potentially everything, from established crowd-pullers to thrilling young blood, from delight and elation to tragedy and pathos, in a package liberally spiced with scandal and gossip.

Key stats
Umar Akmal and Shahid Afridi have been the side's leading batsmen since December 2009. Afridi scored two centuries in the Asia Cup, including a superb 109 off 76 balls in a defeat against Sri Lanka; Saeed Ajmal (17 wickets) and Afridi (19) have been the best bowlers in that period. Umar Gul was in superb form last summer in England, picking up 12 wickets in the five matches, and is by far Pakistan's best limited-overs pace bowler.

Players in focus
For a player of his limited-overs stature and with his nose for the big moment, Shahid Afridi is long overdue a World Cup mega-performance. In 2009, when Pakistan took the World Twenty20 title in England, it was on the strength of his feats. An ambitious man conscious of honours and awards, he will be keen to add World Cup glory to this legacy. Now that he is captain the stakes are that much higher. He is Pakistan's lynchpin, and if he finds form, everybody better watch out. The subcontinental conditions will certainly suit him.

When Umar Akmal gets going, he evokes comparison with hallowed names. With a superb eye and a gift for timing, he is a breathtaking talent. Although his natural impetuosity has rendered him an underachiever in Tests, the same quality is a potential asset in ODIs. He can be particularly skilled at exploiting Powerplays, and his presence adds great pep to Pakistan's batting. The only real drawback is his tendency to throw his wicket away; not quite as bad as with Afridi, but it's there. If he can somehow discover his powers of concentration and curb this self-destructive instinct, Pakistan will be formidable.

Umar Gul is the best bowler in Pakistan's attack, and will shoulder the responsibility for early breakthroughs as well the death overs. He has the pace, precision and experience to prove decisive in both segments. Although a proven match-winner, he is prone to injury - more than is usual for fast bowlers. His fitness is probably going to be Pakistan's biggest worry. Perhaps his most effective weapon is his ability to hold his nerve. He may stare and glare and get into verbal jousts, but in the pure contest between bat and ball, don't expect him to blink first.

Warne mesmerises in classic The greatest World Cup match, and it was a pudgy blond who shone brightest Jamie Alter

Shane Warne
4 for 29 v South Africa, semi-final, 1999

Generations of grandkids will know of the greatest one-day match of all, and of the man who scripted it. It's the stuff of folklore: the bizarre last over, with the two boundaries hammered by Lance Klusener, the inexplicable mix-up with Allan Donald, the scores tied. But without a doubt, every soul who was at Birmingham that lovely day will say it was a pudgy blond's day.

Five months after a return from shoulder injury, Shane Warne bowled a spell uncannily reminiscent of the semi-finals of the 1996 World Cup, when victory had threatened to slip out of Australia's reach. South Africa, chasing 213 to walk into their first such final, were 43 for 0, with Herschelle Gibbs and Gary Kirsten looking good. Enter Warne.

With the second ball of his second over, he ambled in, tongue protruding. Eyes fixed firmly on Gibbs, he unleashed a beauty. It was mesmerising to watch live at the ground - it looped up, drifted away, landed in the rough outside leg stump, and fizzed past a dumbfounded Gibbs to clip off. The ball of Warne's ODI career. As canary-yellow bodies swooped in and embraced the red-faced bowler, the batsman stood in disbelief, refusing to acknowledge that he had been bowled.

Five deliveries later Warne floated another one up in the footmarks outside leg, Kirsten went down to sweep, missed and the ball hit off again. As he let out a war cry heard all the way back in Ferntree Gully, Warne was a sight to behold. Hansie Cronje lasted just two deliveries, as an attempted flick to the on side went to first slip - replays suggested there was no edge - and Warne had three wickets in eight balls.

Warne was taken off after eight overs, but every South African knew that he'd be back for 12 deliveries. The 43rd over was a quiet affair, but in Warne's final one, Shaun Pollock slammed a six and a four before stealing a single into the covers to bring Jacques Kallis, on 53 from 91 balls, on strike.

Warne tossed it up, Kallis checked his drive and sliced straight into the waiting hands of Waugh at cover. A spell of 4 for 29 had been completed. Warne's captivating display inspired his flagging team-mates, changing the mood in a way that only born champions could.

Zero Point

Daily Express News Story

What is Knowledge

•Objective:-

1:- What is Knowledge?
2:- Who owns it?
3:- How can it be best be "Taught" or "Transmitted"

1:- What is "Knowledge"?

• Knowledge is a human ability and not an object’s aspect, as for example, a book. Its transmission involves an intellectual process of education and learning. To transmit information is easy, more than to transmit knowledge. This entails that when we talk about knowledge managing, we mean that we help people to carry out this activity.

• Knowledge has no value if it remains static. It only generates value while moving, that is to say, when it’s being transmitted or converted.

• Knowledge generates knowledge through the use of reasoning or inference (both by humans and machines).

• Knowledge is structured and created; it needs the existence of rich semantic relations between abstract or material entities. A simple database, however records it has, does not constitute knowledge per se.

• Knowledge is always slave of a context. So, to its transmission is necessary that addresser (teacher) knows the context or model of the addressee’s (trainee) world.

• Knowledge can be explicit (when it can be collected, manipulated and transferred easily) or tacit. This is the case of heuristic knowledge that comes from accumulated individuals’ experience.

• Knowledge can be formalized at different levels, even being informal. The most part of verbal knowledge transferred is informal.

• Knowledge is the ability to convert data and information in effective actions.

• "Knowledge" (In the view of Genius People of World):

(i) Hazrat Muhammad Mustafa (S.A.W.W):

• We have to gain knowledge from cradle to grave.

(ii) Hazrat Ali Ibn-e-Imran (A.S):

•Wisdom is the noblest heritage; theoretical and practical knowledge are best marks of distinction.

•The knowledge is very superficial which remains only on your tongue; the intrinsic merit and volume of knowledge is that you act upon it.

•There are many educated people who have ruined their future on account of their ignorance of religion. Their knowledge did not prove of any avail to them.

•Your supremacy over others is proportion to extent of your knowledge and wisdom.

(iii) Alexander Pope:

• A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pier Ian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again.
(Probably the source of the saying, "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing)

(iv) Anais Nin:

• The possession of knowledge does not kill the sense of wonder and mystery. There is always more mystery.

(v) Bertrand Russell:

•The good life is inspired by love and guided by knowledge.

(vi) Daniel J. Boorstin:

•Knowledge is not simply another commodity. On the contrary, Knowledge is never used up. It increases by diffusion and grows by dispersion.

(vii) Dean William R. Inge:
• The aim of education is the knowledge not of fact, but of values.
(viii) Frank Herbert:
• The beginning of knowledge is the discovery of something we do not understand.
(ix) Horace Mann:
• Virtue is an angel, but she is a blind one, and must ask Knowledge to show her the pathway that leads to her goal.
(x) James Madison:
• Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.

2:- Who owns the knowledge?

Knowledge or wisdom is really properties of a faithful follower of God, Though lost to him, get back though you may have to get them from apostates. Value of each man depends upon the knowledge and skill which he has attained. Knowledge is power. It is truth because it gives us strength. Knowledge gives us sense to live in the world. It teaches us how to deal with people and how to come on over problems. Without knowledge man is like an animal. He does not know the social and religious manner. One can live without money but it is difficult to live without knowledge. So every one should love to gain knowledge as it makes us strong able and powerful.
The human minds are receptacles of the secrets of knowledge and wisdom and best receptacle is the one which can hold the most and what it holds it can preserve and protect in the best way. Therefore, there are three kinds of people, one kind is of those learned people who are highly versed in the ethics of truth and philosophy of religion, second is the kind of those who are acquiring the above knowledge, and the third kind is that class of people who are uneducated. They follow every pretender and accept every slogan; they have neither acquired any knowledge nor have secured support of firm and rational convictions.
Knowledge is better than and superior to wealth because protects you and you have to guard wealth; because wealth decreases if you keep on spending it and knowledge increases the more you make use of it; and because what you get through wealth disappears as soon as wealth disappears, but what you achieve through knowledge will remain even after you ( science, philosophy and arts are still there in this world though scientist, philosophers and men of art have died thousands of year back). Knowledge is power and it can command obedience and following; a man of knowledge during his life time can make people obey and follow him and he is praised and venerated after his death; remember that knowledge is a ruler and wealth is its subject.
Those who amass wealth though alive yet are dead to realities of life and those who gather knowledge will remain alive through their knowledge and wisdom even after their death; though their faces may disappear from the community of living beings yet their ideas, the knowledge which they had left behind them and their memory will remain in the minds of men. The knowledge which they have acquired has made them see the realities and visualize the truth, and has instilled into them the spirit of faith and trust. The duties which were decreed as hard and sufferable by ease loving and easy going people are considered easy and bearable by them. They feel happy in the company and association of things which frighten the ignorant and uneducated. They live in this world like everybody else but their souls sour the heights of heavenly eminence. So it can be say that "One who acquires vision becomes wise, and one who attains wisdom achieves knowledge".

3:- How can it be best be "Taught" or "Transmitted"?

The word knowledge we are talking about is sufficient to be taught as compared with transmission, because we can be knowledgeable by others knowledge but we can not be wise by others wisdom. So it is clear point to explain this phenomenon that knowledge should be taught.
All schools, all colleges, have two great functions: to confer, and to conceal, valuable knowledge. The theological knowledge which they conceal cannot justly be regarded as less valuable than that which they reveal. That is, when a man is buying a basket of strawberries it can profit him to know that the bottom half of it is rotten.

Society, community, family are all conserving institutions. They try to maintain stability, and to prevent, or at least to slow down, change. But the organization of the post-capitalist society of organizations is destabilized. Because its function is to put knowledge to work -- on tools, processes, and products; on work; on knowledge itself -- it must be organized for constant change.

Types of Knowledge Transfer:-
(i) Socialization:- The very basis of sharing knowledge and experiences.
(ii) Externalization:- The process of turning tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge. The knowledge, metaphors or analogies of individuals who have already learned the processes is passed on to neophytes.
(iii) Combination:- The creation of more explicit knowledge by gathering knowledge from other organizations.
(iv) Internalization:- The process of turning explicit knowledge into tacit knowledge by becoming proficient at a process to the extent where we can develop some simpler methods of achieving the same result, or achieving the result in less time.
Conclusion:-
So it is concluded that it is good to transmit knowledge but it is best to taught it because while transmitting we don't care about what is actually right or wrong. We will as it is but while teaching knowledge the pupil will other facts and realities and they will also try to find out the truth behind the world and after this they will fully aware from the heights of skies and depth of oceans.

BY: SaRa Tirmizi