Javed Miandad suggests changes to turn Pakistan's fortune on the field

Pakistan registered their first win of the Champions Trophy against one of the pre-tournament favourites South Africa on Wednesday to keep their hopes of progressing through to the semi-finals alive. This win was a shot in the arm for the team, which was down on confidence after suffering a damaging defeat at the hands of their arch-rivals India. But former Pakistani batsman, Javed Miandad seemed dissatisfied by the performance of a few players in the match.

Need to sack underperforming players

Former Pakistan coach, Miandad made his displeasure clear and called on the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to sack the constantly underperforming players. He slammed the selectors for not giving due attention to the fact that a lot of batsmen in the team are eating up too many balls and thus putting the pressure on the other batsmen in the team and also blamed the selectors for not having a definite vision for the progress of the team.

“The selectors lack vision, they should notice these below par performances and should get rid of the players who are proving to be a burden on the team,” Miandad said as quoted by the Dawn.

He was seemingly referring to the senior batsman like Azhar Ali (9 runs off 22 balls) and Mohammad Hafeez (26 runs off 53 balls) whose below par performances allowed the required run-rate to creep up. Though breezy innings from Shoaib Malik and rain intervention meant Pakistan won the match by 19 runs by Duckworth-Lewis method.

Need to make changes in domestic circuit

Miandad further added that there is a need to make radical changes in the Pakistan‘s domestic circuit so next generation of cricketers in Pakistan can improve their game at the domestic level which in turn would result in better performances in the International arena.

“In order to compete with the International teams, we need to improve our domestic cricket, In many of the test playing nations standard of the domestic cricket is greater than International cricket, which is the reason they have plentiful of talented players emerging from their Domestic circuit” Miandad was further quoted by The Dawn.

Pakistan take on Sri Lanka in their final group encounter on 12th June, which is a virtual quarter-final as the winner will get an entry in the semi-finals. Miandad said that Pakistan would have to play out of their skins if they want to excel in this tournament.