Dawn Images

Captain Babar Azam is spicing up studying for ninth graders by becoming the subject of a physics problem in the federal curriculum.

Sandwiched between the Asia Cup and the World Cup series, we’re on a cricket high. Azam has been crowned the best player title many a time over and once again he’s making waves, if not practically then in theory. On Wednesday, a tweet featuring a page from a Pakistani physics book went viral on social media. An official at the Federal Ministry of Education confirmed to Images that the cricketer actually made it to the ninth grade physics book.

The problem is under the Kinetic Energy chapter, discussing the star player’s cover drive. “Babar Azam has hit a cover drive by giving kinetic energy of 150j to the ball by his bat. (a) At what speed will the ball go to the boundary if the mass of the ball is 120 g? (b) How much kinetic energy a footballer must impart to a football of mass 450 g to make it move at this speed?” it read.

A cover drive in cricket is the act of stroking the ball through the covers with well-timed wrist-work and conventional movement of the front foot toward the pitch of a delivery aimed at or outside the off stump.

It makes sense that Azam was the batsman picked for this equation. According to The Indian Express, when former England captain Nasser Hussain was asked to pick his favourite among Azam and Virat Kohli, he said, “Sorry Indian fans. I am going to be biased and go with Babar Azam. I nearly went with Kohli but he is slightly different. He has the fast flick of the wrist but Babar has the conventional way of playing it. If any young boy wants to cover drive, I would say watch Babar Azam.”

Netizens appreciated the “functional” math.

And hailed the captain as king.

They said had these kinds of questions existed in their time, they would have performed much better academically.

This user pointed out that using real life examples is a sign of sharp teaching.

One user took this as an opportunity to turn a real moment from the Pakistan versus Sri Lanka Asia Cup final into an equation of its own.

Bottom line — this speaks of Azam’s success as a cricketer.

Cheers to the ninth grade physics students who have to solve this one.