NEWS
Follow UsThe Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) have appointed Mohammed Hafeez as the head coach for the series against Australia and New Zealand next month, as the board decided to go for a complete reshuffle following Babar Azam’s decision to resign from captaincy responsibilities.
Even though Hafeez does not have any coaching experience, he last played for Pakistan two years ago and holds a significant amount of experience as a player to guide the side through the phase of transition. Pakistan will play three Tests in Australia, and five T20Is in New Zealand in December and January, and ESPN Cricinfo reported that Hafeez will have the complete steering of the side.
That would also mean PCB looking to move away from having two separate persons for the role of head coach and Team Director. While Grant Bradburn was with the squad consistently, Mickey Arthur had been a part of the squad in certain tournaments, but there seems to have been a convergence of roles during the World Cup, which prompted the PCB to take a call.
Following Babar’s resignation, the Pakistan Cricket Board has given the T20I captaincy to Shaheen Shah Afridi, while Shan Masood has been made the Test captain. The latter's first assignment will be a three-match Test series in Australia starting next month. The ODI captain hasn't been announced.
Pakistan could only win four out of nine games and ended the league stage at No. 5. Babar himself had a mediocre tournament with the bat, scoring 320 runs at an average of 40 and a strike rate of 82.90.
He was given the T20I captaincy in 2019 before becoming Pakistan's all-format skipper in 2020. Pakistan played 20 Tests (won 10, lost 6, draw 4), 43 ODIs (won 26, lost 15) and 71 T20Is (won 42, lost 23) under his captaincy.
Under his leadership, the Men in Green made it to the semis of the 2021 T20 World Cup and the finals of the 2022 T20 World Cup. Pakistan also became the top-ranked ODI side under his captaincy.
