Did Shahid Afridi advise Zaka Ashraf to appoint Mohammad Rizwan captain?

Former Chairman of Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) Management Committee Zaka Ashraf has opened up about former captain Shahid Afridi's comment of making Mohammad Rizwan as the white-ball captain of the national team.

Afridi has repeatedly said that in a meeting with Ashraf after Pakistan's horrible performance at the 2023 ODI World Cup, he advised to name wicketkeeper-batter as the skipper.

However, Ashraf has now denied Afridi's claim. "Shahid Afridi had not given me any advice to make Rizwan the captain," he told reporters in Lahore.

Meanwhile, he termed the decision to remove Shaheen Afridi as T20 captain has been taken hastily and revealed the reason for removing Babar as captain during his tenure.

"I offered to retain Babar Azam as the captain for red-ball cricket, but we wanted to appoint a new captain white-ball cricket. He responded by stating that if he were to be replaced as captain in one format, he would rather step down from captaincy in all formats.

"Consequently, I suggested that he should focus on playing as a team member for Pakistan, as it was clear that he was finding it challenging to cope with the pressure of captaincy," he added while wishing best wishes for Babar on his reappointment.

Remember, PCB said that removing Shaheen was “a strategic move aimed at ensuring player well-being and peak performance”.

“While Shaheen Afridi has undeniably proven himself as a star fast bowler, leading Pakistan’s pace attack over the years, the board recognises the importance of rotation and rest to maintain his peak performance. This decision aligns with board's commitment to safeguarding the longevity of the players, especially fast bowlers given their injury timelines in the past two years,” the PCB added.

“Keeping in mind workload management, this decision is to ensure Pakistan main bowlers remain at the top of their game. The board does not want the national men’s team to run into injury crisis concerning the bowling resources as seen before the ICC T20 World Cup 2022, where Shaheen had to be closely looked after and ICC ODI Cricket World Cup 2023, where the team didn’t have the services of Naseem Shah.”

Shaheen replaced Azam as skipper in T20I cricket and Shan Masood in Tests last year.  

Comments

Submit