Ever since former Pakistan captain Misbah-ul-Haq was given the responsibility of the head coach along with selector of Pakistan cricket, a lot of ex-cricketers had openly criticized their country’s board for the decision.
Now, legendary cricketer, Mohammad Yousuf has also joined that league and lampooned the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) for their decision to continue with Misbah as a head coach as well as the selector.
The 45-year-old stated that Misbah doesn’t even have the experience of club level coaching and yet the latter was made the coach of Pakistan team. He termed that it shows the double standards of PCB.
“I don’t understand these double standards of the board. On the one hand, they are asking for all coaching qualifications, and yet they made Misbah head coach, although he had no prior experience of coaching even at club level,” Yousuf said in an interview as quoted by HT.
Yousuf opined that the Pakistan board mocked the merit when they went with Misbah who lacks coaching skills. The Lahore-born further added that since Misbah has no experience of teaching, the PCB made him the coach in Pakistan Super League (PSL) so that he could earn some knowledge of coaching, this is another mockery.
“Appointing Misbah, who has no coaching skills, was equivalent to making a mockery of merit. Another mockery was allowing him to coach in the PSL so that he could gain coaching experience,” added the veteran batsman.
Yousuf even questioned Misbah’s honesty and claimed that while he was a captain, he (Misbah) never allowed Azhar Ali to come into the ODI side.
“I saw a recent media interaction of Misbah, and he was talking about honesty and integrity and all that. Yet when he was captain he never allowed Azhar Ali to come into the one-day squad,” Yousuf added further.
Yousuf also rated Misbah as an average batsman and regarded Azhar as a better batsman in terms of skills and ability.
“In my view, Azhar was a better batsman skill-wise and in terms of ability. But because he had to play as an opener or one down and he took his time to settle down, Misbah didn’t want him because he himself took time to settle down and played slowly.”
“He had no skills. He had a one dimensional game. He played most of the time defensively and only took his chances when the spinners came on,” Yousuf concluded.
Yousuf played 90 Tests, 288 ODIs and 2 T20 internationals, in which he clubbed 7530, 9720, and 50 runs, respectively. The right-hander scored 39 hundreds and 97 half-centuries in international cricket.
