Shaharyar hints at Sarfraz’s Test captaincy

PCB chairman says announcement will be made before Sri Lanka series

LONDON: With Misbahul Haq having bid adieu to Test cricket and with it the captaincy of the Pakistan five-day team, the position at the helm is still vacant. Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Shaharyar Khan, however, believes it is easily deducible who will hold the reigns of the longest format’s team in the years to come.

In an exclusive interview with The Express Tribune, Shaharyar hailed the captaincy of ODI and T20I captain Sarfraz Ahmed and gave a major hint towards his appointment as the Test captain when Pakistan host Sri Lanka in the UAE in October.

“Sarfraz is already the vice-captain [of the Test team]. Misbah has retired. Our next series is in October against Sri Lanka, and I’ll have to announce the new captain before that. So you can conclude yourself who we are going to choose,” said Shaharyar.

He then went on to praise Sarfraz for his captaincy as he led an unfancied Pakistan side to the 2017 Champions Trophy triumph while discussing the next leader of the Test pack. “I have already consulted a lot of people on this matter and I am planning to consult a few more but, truth be told, Sarfraz has delivered very well as the captain of the ODI and T20I side.”

Shaharyar then hailed Sarfraz’s mature approach and his game-changing decisions during the Champions Trophy.

“Sarfraz has matured a lot,” he said. “He made a lot of significant changes in bowling and batting during the Champions Trophy. I was a little worried when he sent Hafeez lower down the order during the final [against India], but Hafeez delivered with a quick-fire fifty. These are the kinds of judgments that make a good captain.”

On Champion Trophy victory

When Pakistan walked into the Champions Trophy as the eighth ranked team and lost to India in their opening encounter, almost everybody was certain Sarfraz’s men would be returning home soon, and Shaharyar admits he was one of them.

“I’ll be honest, I thought even qualifying for the semi-final would be a big achievement for us. I never thought we’d win the tournament,” he said, adding that he was hopeful nonetheless.

“The boys put in a lot of hard work,” Shaharyar continued while praising the team which beat South Africa, Sri Lanka and England before convincingly beating arch-rivals India in the final at The Oval. “They showed a lot of passion.”

The PCB chairman also praised head coach Mickey Arthur for the role he played in Pakistan’s success. “I would also like to mention the role of our head coach Mickey Arthur. The way he has trained the boys is exceptional,” he said. “He is a little strict too with the players, but it is necessary at times.”

He added that Arthur’s uncompromising attitude towards fitness and fielding helped yield this result. “He insisted that he can’t compromise on fitness and fielding. You saw how one player [Umar Akmal] was sent back due to fitness issues, despite him being such a good player.”

On Younus, Misbah’s future

The Pakistan Test team now finds itself with the unenviable task of finding replacements for retired veterans Misbah and Younus Khan, and Shaharyar thinks they are still not done with cricket and will be asked to assist the PCB in whatever capacity they deem fit.

“I had a chat with them,” said Shaharyar. “They said that they’ll need time to decide whether they can take the responsibilities that we give to them. We want them to help us, whether it be as mentor, as coach or as part of the board.”

Biggest regret

Shaharyar, who became the PCB chairman in 2014, is going to end his term in August and has already said that he will not be contesting for the post again.

And despite a generally successful tenure, he does have a few regrets. I wanted to organise Pakistan-India bilateral series,” he said.

Shaharyar revealed how close he had come to achieving that. “We had convinced their board to play with us. I met Shashank Manohar in 2015 and he told me that BCCI is not ready to play in the UAE but they agreed to play in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh,” he said. “We asked Sri Lanka for the venue and they agreed but Shashank had clarified that we can’t play without Indian government’s permission. He called me after two-three days and said the Indian government had said no. So, it wasn’t hard to convince the India board, but the approval from the Indian government is the real problem."