Former Pakistan captain Mohammad Hafeez is of the opinion that the reason why Pakistan’s middle order hasn’t been as consistent as people want them to be is that the Pakistani selectors have been picking their middle order batsmen according to how their top order batsmen play.
Mohammad Hafeez was speaking on a Pakistani show named Game on hai where the former captain of Pakistan women’s team, Sana Mir, first raised the point that since Pakistan’s top order batsmen take a lot of time, the Pakistani selectors feel as if they need those middle order batsmen who are big hitters.
Hafeez seconded that point raised by Sana Mir and said that the middle order batsmen can be timers of the ball as well, they don’t necessarily have to be power hitters. And, Pakistan has got those kinds of options in the form of Shoaib Malik, Haider Ali, Shan Masood, and Kamran Ghulam, who are much better players in terms of batsmanship. They rely on timing, rather than power-hitting.
But, Hafeez also insisted that picking proper middle-order batsmen would be possible only if Pakistan keeps the value of all their wickets the same and the top-order batsmen also take the same amount of risk that the middle-order batsmen are expected to take.
Whoever faces 40 balls in a T20 innings must finish the innings off: Mohammad Hafeez
According to Hafeez, it can’t happen that the top-order batsmen play at their own easy pace and then expect the middle-order batsmen to hit the ball out of the ground straight away. Giving the example of the Pakistan wicketkeeper Mohammad Rizwan who scored 55 off 48 balls in the Asia Cup final, Hafeez said if someone plays more than 40 balls in a T20 inning, it becomes his responsibility to finish the innings off as well.
Mohammad Hafeez is right. People wanted Hafeez and Malik out of the team even though we still have zero replacements. Tell me one team whose entire middle order consists of tulla players. You can’t have Ifti Uncle, Khushdil and Asif in the same team.
Advertisement— yang yoo (@GongRight) August 29, 2022
Pakistan fell 23 runs short of Sri Lanka’s total of 170 in the final of the Asia Cup yesterday and despite being termed favorites ahead of the final, they couldn’t win the tournament.
