ONE has to admire those who follow Pakistan cricket around the globe. For their nerves must be made of steel. Their team never fails to disappoint in its unpredictability, an issue that has been a standing comment from the various cricket broadcasters who report on these matches.
Fresh from a momentous victory in the T20 World Cup held in June of this year in England, the team was bushwhacked on the fields of Sri Lanka during a three match Test series barely a month later, with pretty much the same players who had earlier contributed to the accolades facing a sports-starved nation.
In that the Pakistanis lost the Test series for the first time on Sri Lankan soil is not so much of unease as in the manner they let it slip from their grasp.
Most viewers who followed the Test series would agree without reservations that Pakistan led in about 75 percent of the sessions. But in the ones that mattered, they faltered and faltered badly.
It just took 1 hour for them to lose the first Test match at Galle. During the first innings at Colombo it took just 1 hour for them to collapse, and a similar one-hour for them to collapse during the second innings at Colombo, and gift the series to the hosts.
This was a series of careless batting by the experienced members of the Pakistani batsmen, followed by some very wayward bowling by their strike bowlers and coupled with inept wicket-keeping and poor fielding in those sessions that mattered.
So what could have caused a team fresh from a victory on the world’s stage to perform so badly a few weeks later? Many blame the team composition of the middle order, clamoring for the removal of Misbah, Malik and Kamran Akmal. Misbah, or better known as ‘mishap about to happen’ has indeed failed to inspire confidence.
Malik is no Test player and his contributions only showed up when the team was under no pressure. And the PCB’s persistence with Kamran Akmal who has failed time and again behind the wickets is an indication that perhaps it is the PCB that needs revitalization. None of these experienced batsmen stood up to the challenge when it mattered, surrendering meekly as lambs.
Some former players even went as far as to accuse these three as grouping against the success of the team led by Younis Khan. Others blamed the lack of a batting coach on the roster, or the fact that Pakistan had very little Test match practice in the last couple of years. Such concerns should have been picked up by the PCB and reviewed carefully.
But sports and politics in Pakistan are heavily intertwined. Personalities, rather than sports wisdom dictate the direction of cricket in that country. The recent exodus of ex-cricketers from the PCB speaks of volumes in the mismanagement of the organization.
This bi-polar disorder within the Pakistani cricket team does not appear to have an immediate remedy. And that bodes more of the same steel nerves for Pakistani fans in the future.
