EVEN the most imaginative of soap writers could not come up with the storylines that blight Pakistani cricket.

Infighting and scandal is nothing new, and neither are the massive highs and sorry lows we have seen already this summer.

Only Pakistan could go from beating Australia to being comprehensively hammered by England.

While Andrew Strauss’s men looked a very capable and efficient outfit, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe would have put up more of a fight at Trent Bridge.

What must infuriate Pakistani cricket followers is the sheer lack of consistency – on and off the pitch.

They have all of the ability in the world, yet they fail to scale true heights for any length of time.

The margin of their defeat to England suggests they are in for a difficult summer, but it would be of no real surprise if they suddenly gave the Three Lions a real run for their money.

Their bowling attack, consisting of Umar Gul, Mohammad Asif and the precocious Mohammad Aamer stacks up against any seam bowling department around while their legspinner Danish Kaneria is the finest exponent of his art in world cricket.

So what did Pakistan do after Kaneria’s lack of success in seamer friendly conditions? They replace the man with five seasons of county cricket experience at Essex with 18- year-old rookie Raza Hasan.

Sometimes, they just don’t help themselves.

And how Kamran Akmal remains as wicketkeeper is beyond me. He dropped three catches (including England’s centurion, Eoin Morgan, on 23), and missed the simplest of stumpings. Maybe they thought he would drop himself?

Thankfully, they have seen some sort of sense and recalled former captain Mohammed Yousuf to shore up their fragile batting line-up.

In a country that lives and breaths cricket, talent will never be a problem.

But the whole will never be greater than the sum of the parts unless some unity is brought into the camp.

Imran Khan is probably the only captain to have done this – when he led his country to World Cup glory and Test success in the early 1990s.

For the good of international cricket, we can only hope somebody of similar ilk can realise the potential of such talented individuals. At the moment though, they are a long way from giving England a real Test.