LAHORE: Pakistan pacer Wahab Riaz celebrates his 37th birthday on Tuesday (today). Born on 28th June 1985, Wahab’s trysts with serious cricket began in early 2000s as he made his first-class debut in the 2001-02 season. But the national selectors picked him for the ODI side in 2008. And after the magical fifer against India in the 2011 semi-finals, one of his balls, a toe-crushing yorker swirling in to beat the defences of Yuvraj Singh will remain a career highlight for the man from Lahore. As a lower order batsman, he is highly under-rated but is never shy to have a stomach for a fight with the willow in his hands. The left-arm seamer made his ODI debut in 2008 but had to wait two years for his first Test, where he made an impact at The Oval, taking a match-winning 5 for 63, becoming the ninth Pakistan bowler to take five on debut. Among his victims were Andrew Strauss, Jonathan Trott and Kevin Pietersen. However, he had poor tours of New Zealand and West Indies in 2011, and was dropped from the Test side. In the World Cup in 2015, he gave the Australians — Shane Watson in particular — jitters with his hostile spell in the quarter-final in Adelaide. After two years out of the ODI side, he made it to his third World Cup, in 2019, and took three apiece in Pakistan’s wins over England and South Africa. Wahab has the pace to trouble the best, but hasn’t always combined it with consistency. He has benefited from Pakistan’s chronic poor luck with fast bowlers: with Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif missing more than they play and Umar Gul injury-prone. Since he came into national reckoning, Wahab has had some good moments in international cricket, but consistency hasn’t been his strongest suit. As an ODI bowler he has been a wicket-taker but has also leaked plenty of runs. Wahab has been in the mix in Pakistan’s ODI side, even though his economy rate continues to be a concern. He has taken 83 wickets in 27 Tests, 120 wickets in 120 ODIs and 34 wickets in 36 T20Is.