No replacement for Misbah at the moment, says Miandad

Legendary batsman believes domestic cricket structure has failed to find suitable replacement for 42-year-old

Pakistan legend Javed Miandad has blamed the country's domestic structure for being unable to find Test captain Misbahul Haq's replacement and believes this has caused the 42-year-old to delay his retirement call.



“The problem is we don't have anyone to replace Misbah," Miandad told the Associated Press on Saturday. "This shows how weak our cricketing structure is. Everywhere in the world there's a system in place and players come and go, but unfortunately we didn't adopt any such system.”

He added: "Why are we now asking Misbah to leave? Have we prepared any replacement for him? Unfortunately the answer is no and now it's entirely upto Misbah to decide himself when he wants to quit.”

When Pakistan lost the second Test in Melbourne, there was strong speculation that Misbah would retire, but Misbah led the side in Sydney and only acknowledged after the series whitewash that he will take time to ponder over his future.

 

And Miandad believes that Misbah is left with no other option than to continue leading Pakistan.

"That's the unfortunate part of Pakistan cricket," said Miandad. "Misbah knows it very well that there's nobody who could lead the Test side and that's why he has not yet made up his mind."

Misbah, who is Pakistan's most successful Test captain with 24 victories from 53 matches, managed scores of 4, 5, 11, 0, 18 and 38 in six Test innings in Australia and Miandad said the players lacked the skill to perform Down Under.

"I am sorry to say but we don't have players of such caliber," said Miandad. "Playing aggressive cricket is the key to success in Australia and we were too defensive in our approach in batting, bowling and fielding."