The arrival of WT20 has added a fresh chapter to the long and thriving list of comic tragedies that PCB has been involved in. Here’s a timeline review of the selection goof-ups that have transpired in the last 30 days.
10 February 2016 – To meet ICC deadlines, PCB announced its squad for the Asia Cup and the World T20 a week into the PSL. Keeping in mind that the World Cup was right after the Asia Cup, it made sense to select the same squad for both tournaments to be able to test the whole squad, and assess their strengths to arrive at a perfect playing XI. Sadly, that’s where the sense ended.
The squad PCB selected was this: Afridi (captain), Hafeez, Malik, U Akmal, Sarfaraz, Babar Azam, Iftikhar, Imad Wasim, Anwar Ali, Irfan, Wahab, Amir, Nawaz, K Manzoor, and Rumman Raees.
Frustrated with Ahmed Shehzad, the Selection Committee decided to drop him. The problem? Finding a half-decent opener who could take his place. Various names were being thrown up for discussion. There was Sharjeel Khan, a good prospect but someone who hadn’t done much to impress on the international stage.
There were talks of bringing back Kamran Akmal (thank god we didn’t go down that road again). Nauman Anwar was another prospect (in my opinion the best option) who had performed really well in the last domestic T20 tournament but hadn’t got the big break.
Yet PCB selected Khurram Manzoor, who was yet to debut for Pakistan in this format and hadn’t played a T20 in 2 years. He was selected based on List A performances against England Lions.
Another star performer out of the last domestic T20 was Iftikhar Ahmed. Yet he wasn’t tried in any of the T20s Pakistan played in the following months, was debuted instead in ODIs against England and then dropped. Failing in the PSL, he also found a spot in Pakistan’s squad.
Hafeez in the last 3 years has been a T20 pedestrian with hardly any performance of note. Since July 2013, in 32 matches, Hafeez has averaged 18.3 with the bat striking at 107.9. Without his bowling, there is no case for Hafeez being in the team and yet he too found a place in Pakistan’s squad – PCB once again reiterating that seniority rules.
Keeping in mind that the World T20 is being held in India, you’d think a specialist spinner might help. We selected 3 spinning all-rounders (Afridi, Imad and Nawaz) but no specialist spinner. This selection was not for a lack of choice. There were many that caught the eye in PSL – Zulfiqar Babar, Mohammad Asghar and Usama Mir come to mind. Moreover, Pakistan did not give Imad Wasim a single game in the Asia Cup, and Nawaz played only two. However, let’s reflect on the fact that Pakistan is taking a battery of 5 pacers to spin-friendly India.
And to think these are only the issues that came up in the original squad selection. The real comedy started after the initial squad was announced.
21 February 2016 - As PSL carried on, Sharjeel hit a 100 in a virtual semi-final & Sami delivered some sensational spells to get the selectors thinking. Khalid Latif also impressed with the bat, while Iftikhar failed & Rumman Raees failed to give a great show with the ball.
22 February 2016 - Two injuries followed to Babar Azam (a promising young batsman) and Rumman Raees.
23 February 2016 – Babar and Rumman were replaced by Sharjeel and Sami; it seemed the selectors couldn’t wait to make replacements and gave them no time to recover. There were rumours that the injuries were minor and could easily have healed in time. To make matters more complicated, Iftikhar was dropped for the World Cup without being given a chance, and replaced by Khalid Latif.
The bigger comedy? Iftikhar was still part of the Asia Cup, which meant whatever Iftikhar did in the Asia Cup wouldn’t have mattered to WT20 selection and Khalid Latif would go into the WT20 completely untested. The only way Afridi managed to avoid this potential selection disaster from fully materializing was by not playing Iftikhar in any Asia Cup game at all, except the last game against Srilanka where he didn’t get to bat.
2 March 2016 - While Pakistan was playing against Bangladesh, news emerged that Ahmed Shehzad had been asked to submit his passport to PCB for processing. Everyone knew this was a replacement call for Khurram Manzoor. Imagine the humiliation of players getting to know they might be dropped mid-match.
4 March 2016 - As expected, the Asia Cup exposed many of the issues that were staring Pakistan in the face yet somehow oblivious to PCB. Khurram Manzoor’s selection was a disastrous failure. Hafeez’s form in T20s worsened. Sharjeel showed the problems he had in his earlier selections still persist, and how short-sighted it was to select someone based on a single innings.
Sami yet again cost Pakistan an important game and the tournament itself, as Pakistan crashed out of the Asia Cup following Sami’s shambolic 15 runs over defending 18 off 12.
5 March 2016 - It emerged next day that PCB was considering Ahmed Shehzad, Salman Butt, Kamran Akmal and Zulfiqar Babar for selection.
Out of these 4, only Shehzad and Zulfiqar looked somewhat sensible as they both had a decent PSL and it seemed the selectors had finally woken up to the need of a specialist spinner in spin-friendly India. Salman Butt last played a T20 in 2010. YES, 6 years ago. He hasn’t yet played a domestic T20 on return and was being seriously considered for selection.
The head coach Waqar Younis wanted him in the squad and Shahid Afridi, the captain was vehemently against it. Salman Butt has never been regarded as a viable T20 batsman who in 24 T20 internationals, averages 28 with a strike rate of 107. His 3 half-centuries have come against Canada, Bangladesh of 2010, and a 67* against the Kiwis in a chase of 133 which Pakistan still lost. Hardly T20 material.
The stupidity of Salman Butt’s selection would have even outranked the selection of Khurram Manzoor.
Mind also boggles at the reconsideration of Kamran Akmal. Quite how his name keeps returning to the national side on the eve of World Cups is beyond me. Kamran Akmal failed to impress in the PSL, looked out of sorts against both pace and spin, scoring 151 runs in 10 matches and yet here was, a contender for WT20 selection.
7 March 2016 – PCB officially replaced Khurram Manzoor with Ahmed Shehzad. What face have PCB left to save after re-selecting Ahmed Shehzad, roughly a month after they dropped him; someone they didn’t think good enough in the first place to represent Pakistan in these marquee tournaments?
There was still no place for a specialist spinner in the squad. Among all these changes, Hafeez is still part of the team. 31 runs in 4 Asia Cup games, an average performance in PSL, and in a state of constant decline since the last 3 years - Hafeez is still part of the team.
From the captain to the coach to the whole PCB setup, everyone seems to be bemoaning the lack of talent and performance in Pakistan cricket. They are in complete disconnect with the cause and effect of the deepening malaise in Pakistan cricket and are again side-stepping the severe need to diagnose the real issue.
Our selection committees are time and again selecting the wrong people in the squad and their decision making and analytical skills have gone so bad, their decisions no longer warrant a sensible ‘for and against’ argument, and have become a national laughing stock.
What does it say about PCB’s integrity when it has to chop and change the squad at least 3 times (including the dropping and re-selection of the same person) after submitting its final squads to ICC? To add to the problem, the team management is even failing to extract the best out of the selected squad with unbalanced playing XIs and employing the wrong combinations. When you pick players that do not deserve a spot, their performances show lack of confidence and insecurity, which ultimately rubs off on the whole team.
To make matters worse, PCB has set up an inquiry committee to investigate the performance of the team in the Asia Cup, just before the WT20, while the PCB President is busy revealing his private commitments with the captain Shahid Afridi. As a captain who has made many mistakes and really needs all the help he can get, PCB is doing all it can on all fronts to ensure the team leadership, including Afridi, is completely demoralized, and that the team is in the worst possible state before a global tournament.
Once again Pakistan heads into a major tournament unaware of its best XI, its best batsmen, or the best combinations. A sad and fairly predictable state now, that Pakistan cricket tends to find itself in.
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