Islamabad, November 13 (Online): Former pacer Mohammad Amir believes that the system should not be held responsible for Pakistan’s poor performance during the 2023 ICC World Cup.
While talking about Haarna Mana Hay, Amir said he was not impressed with Babar Azam’s captaincy and urged the latter to change his mindset.
“What is the system? This is not a wall. The responsibility of managing Pakistan cricket has been given to five and six people. The captain is one of them. We won the World Cup in 1992 under Imran Khan, the system was the same. In 1999, our team became world champion and reached the final.
“We won the 2009 T20 World Cup with the same system, we won the 2017 Champions Trophy with the same system,” Amir said.
“Babar has been the captain for the last four years. He formed his own team. Buttler is not part of our system, so why did England play so poorly? Does the system in the UK also need renewal? After the debacle in 2015, Morgan said I want to play this brand of cricket, I want these 25 players.
“The system remained the same, it was the captain who changed his mentality. The system can’t do anything unless the captain’s mentality changes. “Was it the system that told him not to play with Abrar Ahmed, or the one that benched Fakhar after the first match?”
The 1992 champions failed to reach the semi-finals of the exhibition event in India and ended their season with a fifth defeat in nine matches against England on Saturday.
Earlier, former Pakistan captain Wasim Akram had stated that the pressure of leading the team had affected Azam’s batting in the 2023 ICC World Cup.
The 29-year-old managed to score just 320 runs at an average of 40, including four fifties. He was Pakistan’s third highest run-getter after Mohammad Rizwan (395 runs) and Abdullah Shafique (336 runs).
Speaking to a local sports channel, the Sultan of Swing stated that Babar Azam should forget about captaincy while batting.
“Yes, the pressure of captaincy took its toll on him and he looked stressed in both the Asia Cup and the World Cup,” Wasim said.
“The captaincy pressure will always be there, but when he is in the middle as a batsman he has to focus on getting there and how to get runs,” he added.
news source (onlinenews.com.pk)
