Hasan Ali urges PCB to strengthen the bench

Pakistan’s ³fast bowler Hasan Ali has voiced his concerns over the proposed “surgery” in the team setup by PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi.

In an exclusive interview with Cricket Pakistan, Hasan expressed uncertainty over the chairman’s comments about surgery and questioned whether all 11 players would be replaced, emphasizing the impracticality of such a drastic measure due to the team’s lack of sufficient backups.

“I don’t know in what context the chairman has mentioned surgery. Will they change all 11 players but that is not possible. I am really sorry to say because we don’t have such backups that we can change all 11 players.

“I don’t know what surgery will be, but things should be absolutely correctly done and should be for the betterment of cricket. The chairman should take strong steps and make firm decisions,” Hasan said.

The pacer stressed the importance of ensuring that decisions made are in the best interest of Pakistani cricket, advocating for strong leadership and firm decisions from the chairman.

He highlighted the need to strengthen Pakistan’s bench strength, citing examples where other countries maintain multiple squads for international tours, which Pakistan currently lacks.

“We should strengthen our bench, which every team in the world does. We have seen in the recent past that one country continues to field two teams on international tours. If Pakistan had these two teams today, we wouldn’t have to talk about doing surgery or this or that. “Now for example, a Test series is coming and if Pakistan won’t have an alternate spinner then who will we play?”

To perform surgery, surgical equipment is essentially needed and should be used carefully,” he added.

It is worth noting that following Pakistan’s defeat to India in the T20 World Cup 2024, PCB Chief Naqvi openly criticised the team’s performance and suggested that significant changes were necessary.