'We are to blame for Babar Azam-Shaheen Afridi friction': Ex-PAK batter slams PCB for tension between star players

Pakistan cricket has been lurching from one controversy to another, chiefly fuelled by instability in the Pakistan Cricket Board. The effect of this has leaked out to the field in recent months with Pakistan recently suffering a stunning 2-0 defeat in a Test series at home against Bangladesh. Shaheen Afridi had made Pakistan's white ball captain after Babar Azam had stepped, only for him to be replaced by the latter just months after being appointed. (AFP)

They had reached the final of the 2022 T20 World Cup but since then, they have failed to impress in the major tournaments. Pakistan had been knocked out of the group stage of both the 2023 World Cup and the 2024 T20 World Cup. However, the historic first-ever Test series defeat to Bangladesh at home has ramped up the scrutiny on the team and pressure from media. Among the many issues that seem to be plaguing is the apparent tension between star batter Babar Azam and pace spearhead Shaheen Afridi, arguably the two faces of the Pakistan team at the moment.

Pakistan opener Mudassar Nazar has blamed PCB for the escalating tension between the two senior players, insisting that the board must provide its captain with ample support and time to assert his leadership. "It is our own doing (the friction between Babar and Shaheen). We shouldn't have messed around with the set-up," Mudassar told PTI on the sidelines of the 'Cricket Predicta Conclave' in Ajman, UAE.

"There was one set captain, we should have given him a longer term and if somebody else had been made a captain, then he should have had a decent go at it. And not been thrown out straight away."

Babar had been Pakistan's captain in all three formats until November 2023, after which Afridi was appointed as skipper in white-ball cricket. However, the pacer was replaced by Babar in the role barely a few months after he had been made captain. Afridi even went on record to say that the right decision would've been to make Mohammad Rizwan the captain of the limited overs squads. Babar has now resigned from white-ball captaincy again this week.

‘It goes in a cycle’

Nazar, who represented Pakistan from 1976 to 1989 and amassed 6,767 runs in 76 Tests and 122 ODIs while also taking 177 wickets across both formats, slammed the PCB for neglecting the mounting issues within Pakistan cricket, asserting that the board bears full responsibility for the sport's decline in the nation.

"It goes in a cycle. In Pakistan, yes, we are down at the moment. A lot of that is our own fault, the way we run cricket in Pakistan. Nobody has addressed the issue seriously. We are changing the cricket board after every two, three, four months, a year.

“That hasn't helped either. But I'm hopeful one day Pakistan cricket will come up and surely it will because before you know it, you get three, four new players who come in and start to make a name for themselves. And there you go, the Pakistan team becomes one of the top teams again,” said Nazar.

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