LAHORE: Pakistan star batter Babar Azam did not set any conditions before accepting the role of Pakistan’s Test captain for a second stint, according to the Pakistan Cricket Board’s selection committee.
On Saturday, the PCB announced Pakistan’s Test squad for their forthcoming tours of West Indies and England and named Babar as Test captain following his appointment in place of Shan Masood.
Chairman of the selection committee, Aaqib Javed revealed the move after lengthy deliberations regarding Pakistan’s poor performance under Shan Masood’s captaincy.
“Babar Azam did not put any condition before accepting Test captaincy,” Aaqib said, adding that he was hopeful of seeing better performances from Pakistan with a new Test captain at the helm.
He maintained that although Shan Masood gave good personal performances for Pakistan, his overall contributions were not satisfactory enough.
However, Aaqib also stressed that consistency is important in bilateral matches. Both the captain and selection committee need excellent performances to ensure consistency, as the Bangladesh tour proved. The former captain pointed out that the Bangladesh tour made it clear that pace had to increase in the Pakistani fast bowling lineup. However, he stated that the conditions in England would be different from Bangladesh.
The former Pakistan captain and selection committee member Misbah-ul-Haq stated that Babar’s promotion was due to his overall contributions to Pakistan cricket, not only his performance in the T20 format.
“Babar continues to remain an important player for us across all formats,” said Misbah. He admitted that although the batter performs well in ODI and T20I formats, there is still room for improvement in Tests. Moreover, he added that a captain should have excellent performance as both a player and a captain.
He also confirmed that the fast bowler Naseem Shah would play domestic cricket and be selected when needed.
Babar resigned as the captain of Pakistan in all formats after the poor performance in the 2023 ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup and Shan Masood was appointed the Test captain of the team.
However, Pakistan struggled under Shan’s leadership, losing 12 of their 16 Test matches, including home and away series whitewashes against Bangladesh. Those results ultimately prompted the PCB to make another leadership change ahead of the upcoming overseas assignments.
