Pakistan cricket's downfall: 18-month strategy behind the low point

A commentary on the state of cricket in Pakistan and the efforts that led to its current position

Conversation Between Samir and Uncle Tom, at the ICC Awards ceremony in January 2023.

Uncle Tom: Hey Samir, did you see that?

Samir: Yes uncle Tom, I did.

Uncle Tom: What is going on over here? I thought we had already destroyed Pakistan cricket. You assured me that they will not play the most prestigious T20 cricket league in the world, will not have international cricket in their backyard, or even have international players in their domestic T20 league.

Sameer: Yes, that was the plan, and it was going really well. However, they called in Ehsan Mani and made him Chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) in 2018. Mani was a chartered accountant from England, and resided there since the 1960’s. He joined the International Cricket Council (ICC) in 1989 where he held multiple positions including being on the board for the 1996 and 1999 World Cups. He was elected as the Chairman of the ICC Finance and Marketing Committee in 1996. In 2003 he became the President of the ICC for a further three years, finishing his seventeen year period at the top of ICC’s hierarchy.

To make things worse Mani hired Wasim Khan as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the PCB. Wasim played for England’s under-19s and won the county championship in 1995, averaging 49. With his Masters from the prestegeous Warwick university he became the CEO of Chance to Shine, the charitable arm of the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB). He was also on the board of the Anti-Corruption and Security Unit of the ECB and was made the Chief Executive of the Leicestershire County Cricket Club.

With deep rooted connections and lobbying skills in the international cricket arena, together the duo convinced the English Test Team to tour Pakistan after Seventeen years, Australia after twenty four years, South Africa after eighteen and New Zealand after twenty years. With almost two decades of complete isolation, all the SENA nations were brought back to Pakistan in a space of 24 months between January 2021 to December 2022.

Uncle Tom: Look at the stage Samir, it's flooded by the rise of unprecedented accolades for Pakistani cricketers.

Shaheen Afridi became the first Pakistani cricketer ever to win cricket’s most prestigious annual ICC award “Cricketer of the Year” in 2021, and Babar Azam has now won the same trophy in 2022. Three Pakistani cricketers appeared in the ICC Test Team of the Year in 2021 (including Fawad Alam), most ever by Pakistan. In fact, prior to these four, only six Pakistani cricketers had appeared on that list in its nineteen year history.

Babar Azam also became the first Pakistani cricketer ever to win the ICC ODI Cricketer of the Year, and he has now done it twice in a row. Babar has made it to the ODI Team of the Year four times, twice more than Saeed Ajmal and Umar Gul who got the award twice, the only other cricketers in Pakistan to have achieved it multiple times.

Mohammad Rizwan has now gotten ICC awards in consecutive years across formats including “T20I cricketer of the Year” in 2021 and Haris Rauf, Hasan Ali and Fakhar Zaman are all getting ICC awards too. Fatima Sana and Nida Dar also bagged awards at the ICC ceremony for Pakistan Women’s cricket.

These two years have been by far the most successful in terms of the ICC awards for Pakistan. In fact, by sheer luck (popularly known as Qudrat ka Nizam) Pakistan recently also reached a World T20 final down under in Australia.

Uncle Tom: Thank you for the long lecture Samir. But what do we do now? You had promised to destroy Pakistan cricket. You have to keep your word.

Samir: Don’t worry uncle Tom. These awards are temporary, this success of Pakistan cricket will not last long. We have already set the destruction machine in motion.

Uncle Tom: What is your plan?

Samir: Ehsan Mani had completed his three year contract as Chairman and left for England. Wasim Khan resigned four months before his three year contract ended, his family had already moved back a year earlier, finding it difficult to adjust in Pakistan. Ramiz Raja took over the reins as chairman for a year and continued to back the team built under the leadership of Babar Azam.

Uncle Tom: Samir, don’t waste my time. What are we going to do with Pakistan cricket?

Samir: It is simple uncle Tom. We ransacked the PCB headquarters last month. We did not let Ramiz take any of his belongings. In fact we will not even let him enter that office. You know how we love a coup. We have already installed a political pawn in place. He will follow orders. We will ask him to make wholesale changes in the system created by his predecessors. Six months later we will replace him with another political puppet who will do nothing. The two will truly represent the spirit of their political parties; Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz PML (N) and Pakistan People Party (PPP) respectively.

Then in a year, we will take the two most coveted and also stressful positions in Pakistan, the Interior Minister and the PCB chairman and give it to one person, who will directly report to us. He will put the final nail in the coffin, and we will bury Pakistan cricket at home, against Bangladesh next year.

Uncle Tom: What about this team? They seem so united, they are like family!

Samir: Divide and rule uncle Tom, divide and rule. We will make them clash over captaincy.

Uncle Tom: But these guys are best friends. Only last month Shaheen tweeted. "Babar Azam hamari or Pakistan ki Shan, jaan or pehchan hai. Wo Hamara kaptaan hai or rahe ga. Kuch or #SochnaBhiManaHai. Please support this team. Yahi team hame jitaye gi bhi. Kahani abhi Khatam nahi howi" (Babar Azam is our and Pakistan's pride, life and identity. He is our captain and will remain so. #NotAllowedToThinkOtherwise. Please support this team. This team will make us win. The story is not over yet)

Samir: You do not know the lure of the throne and the intoxication of power. Even the best get swayed, what they call family do not even remain friends. First we will make Shadab Captain against Afghanistan and give him a weak team. If he loses, there will be a frenzy, if he wins, there will be a feud. Then we will repeat the same with Shaheen. Give them just one series each. I bet you 100 quid this will destroy the dressing room. “Dosti Yaari” will turn into “Dhoka and Dushmani” (Friends will turn into enemies).

Let’s get Imad Wasim and Mohammad Aamir back into the side for the next World T20. We know how well they get along with this current gang. While we are at it, let's also put Shan in the mix of captaincy and let Rizwan also think he could get that job. Saud Shakeel has also started his career well, let’s make him vice captain and give him aspirations of his own. Let’s have at least six captains in one squad.

Uncle Tom: The players are earning so much these days. They are too comfortable in their lives. We need to address this too.

Samir: Don’t worry, there is a World Cup in India later this year. We will send them there without paying them for five months, we will not renew their central contracts. Let them play without pay. When we sign the contract, we will allow them to play two international T20 leagues. Let their managers sign deals with clubs, we will refuse NOC’s at the last minute. Let’s make every single club in the world think twice before they sign any Pakistani cricketer. How dare they make so much money.

We will get an ex-minister, and forgotten anchor person to investigate the wealth of Babar Azam and accuse him for corruption and match fixing. Let’s hit them from all sides. Will also ask ex-cricketers to attack all these boys on TV. Let’s make villains out of these heroes of Pakistan. Yeh sumjhtey kiyaa hein apnay aap ko? (what do they think of themselves?)

Uncle Tom: Do you think these foreign coaches with a difficult English accent are more harmful or local ones without any accreditation to be a coach.

Samir: We will have a mix of both evils. And we will replace them so fast that the team will not know who their coach is tomorrow, or sometimes even today. We need at least seven head coaches a year, if not eight. Add constantly rotating batting and bowling coaches, surrounded by mentors of all shapes, colours and sizes. And the circus will be complete. The trick is to have a new clown every series.

Uncle Tom: The circus is not complete without the jugglers; the selectors.

Samir: We have that sorted too. We will make Wahab Riaz chief selector and ask Salman Butt to assist him. Wahab did after all wear that white jacket, but Salman took the fall for it. Maybe the Pakistani public will not notice Butt in the selection panel, like they do not notice Wahab in the sports ministry. If they do, we will just flood two dozen selectors and half a dozen chief selectors in two years. We will restructure the selection process such that no one will really know who is selecting the team.

Uncle Tom: Well done Samir, but it seems you forgot about the Pakistan Super League (PSL). There is surely nothing you can do about its success. They love that product.

Samir: Let’s set up a rival league, launch multiple T20 domestic leagues and eat into the share of the PSL. Why are these private enterprises becoming so powerful in Pakistan cricket? They too, should be put in their place.

Let’s also introduce ODI competitions in between breaks of the packed schedule of back to back Test series. The best way to practice for red ball cricket is to practice with a white ball. Let’s overwork these fast bowlers and break them down. Send them to one of our camps in the mountains and let them run with big rocks on their heads. Not let them play leagues abroad. Come’on uncle Tom. I am running out of ideas to destroy Pakistan cricket. Help me here.

Uncle Tom: Well done son! Samir, I like your boots, they’re always well polished.

Samir: Thank you uncle Tom.

Uncle Tom: You know Samir, I just complimented myself and I am just your alter ego. People will think you have lost it, and are talking to yourself. I am just in your head, you know.

Samir. I don’t care what the people think, most of them are just mere civilians. But I have one last surprise for you.

Uncle Tom: What is it Samir?

Samir: The next time England tour Pakistan. We will physically break all the stadiums down and try to take Pakistan Test cricket back to the UAE. The people of Pakistan can watch it on TV, they don’t come to the stadium anyway.

Just imagine, no security concerns, no road blockages, no traffic jams, no heart breaks and eventually no Test cricket in Pakistan. Pakistan cricket just needs to slip to number 10 in the ICC Test rankings and our job is done.

Good riddance to bad rubbish, we know what is best for this country. Don’t we, Uncle Tom?

Uncle Tom: You are right Samir. Wasim Khan went from being CEO of Pakistan cricket (a post we have now abolished) to becoming the General Manager at the ICC. While we have replaced Wasim Khan, Ehsan Mani and Ramiz Raja with a person who is a Minister of Narcotics, a Senator, a Minister of Interior and runs a very successful media house with multiple TV channels. All at the same time.

Look at how much we have done for this country. And then they blame us for everything.

 

“Pity a nation that despises a passion in its dream, yet submits in its awakening.” Kahlil Jibran.

The writer was not a skilled cricketer, so he became a talented critic. You can find him here.