The Pakistani Men’s National Cricket Team delivered a below par performance in the ICC T20 World Cup 2024 under the leadership of Babar Azam. The Shaheens lost their opening match against co-hosts USA and failed to secure an easy win against fierce rivals India before defeating Canada and Ireland in their third and fourth matches of the tournament respectively.
But after the defeats against USA and India, the damage had already been done and the victories against Canada and Ireland were not enough for the Green Shirts to secure qualification for the Super 8 and they got knocked out of the group stage phase of the 2024 T20 World Cup.
The Shaheens didn’t perform well in last year’s ODI World Cup in India as well and immediately after the conclusion of the tournament, Babar Azam was forced to resign as the white ball skipper.
Following his resignation, Shaheen Shah Afridi was appointed as the new white ball skipper of the Shaheens but under his leadership, Pakistan lost the away five match T20 International series against New Zealand by a margin of 4-1 and the PCB weren’t convinced with the leadership skills of Shaheen so they replaced him with Babar Azam ahead of the 2024 T20 World Cup.
But following Pakistan’s early elimination from the T20 World Cup 2024, many Cricketing experts want Babar to be relieved from his leadership duties. However, that seems very unlikely as many news reports are saying that the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) is likely to stick with Babar as the white ball skipper for the time being.
Under the captaincy of the 29 year old, the Green Shirts reached the semi finals of the 2021 T20 World Cup and finished as the runners up in the T20 World Cup 2022. But, despite going through several structural-changes, the silverware remained unattainable.
Following the defeat against India on 9th June at the Nassau Country International Cricket Stadium of New York, Mohsin Naqvi – chief of the PCB stated that Pakistan Cricket will be undergoing a Major Surgery. This statement was made after the increase in tensions within the Pakistani camp as the Babar Azam-led team suffered a shocking defeat at the hands of co-hosts USA, which is considered as one of the biggest upsets in the world of Cricket.
Naqvi also gave some hints in regards to the changes in captaincy but he didn’t mention what decision the PCB are planning to make and made a promise that consultations are taking place regarding the same.
“At one point of time, I thought that the Men’s team requires a minor surgery which can help them win games but now a major surgery is required in order to help Pakistan get back to winning ways. The defeat against the USA is unacceptable and disappointing and the way we lost to India is very shameful. We now need to start looking beyond certain players in the squad and some major changes will have to be made,” Mohsin Naqvi said after the defeat against India.
“The consultation process is going on and I feel that it’s not appropriate to discuss the captaincy matter further at this point of time,” Naqvi added.
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